On-Line Payments Merchant Service

The Vendor is required to provide secure on-line payment services for the purpose of the payment of taxes, parking tickets and water and sewer charges.
- Capable of delivering a PCI-compliant, batch-based payment platform that supports multiple payment modalities, integrates with the City’s existing tax software and utility billing software, and improves customer service while maintaining strong financial controls, auditability, and data security.
- Payment Processing Requirements:
• Credit card processor compatibility.
• The city reserves the right to continue using its existing credit card processor.
• Must ensure its software is compatible with city merchant services/fiserv and the first data north network, which are currently used by the city.
• The point-of-sale (POS) system must also be compatible with the FDMS county, buypass, or north processing platform and be EMV certified or capable of connecting to a gateway that is EMV certified.
- Security
• System must support Single Sign-On (SSO) via Microsoft Entra ID (Azure AD)
• Support for Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) required
• Data must be encrypted in transit and at rest
• Role-based access controls must be available
• Hosting provider must be SOC 2–compliant or higher
• Hosting environment must provide high availability and redundancy
• Backup and restore capabilities must be in place for disaster recovery
- Support guest (one-time) payments as well as registered customer accounts with single sign-on (SSO) functionality;
- Seamlessly integrate with Quality Data Service, Inc. (QDS) tax software, Versions 5;
- Accept online payments via:
• Credit and debit cards (Visa, Mastercard, Discover, American Express);
• ACH / eCheck;
• Digital wallets and alternative payment methods, including Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, and Venmo;
- Provide safeguards against fraud, duplicate payments, invalid data entry, and unauthorized transactions;
- Intelligent communication tools, including:
• Email notifications for upcoming and overdue bills;
• Text (SMS) reminders and confirmations;
• Text-based payment capabilities;
• Recurring payment options;
- Accept online payments for parking tickets and water/sewer, with separate reporting and batch processing;
- Support next-business-day consolidated settlement, deposited within a single daily batch, for all payment types;
- Provide an open-banking eCheck payment option designed to reduce ACH returns for R03 (No Account) and R04 (Invalid Account Number);
- Support PCI-validated P2PE (Point-to-Point Encryption) payment terminals, including both countertop and wireless devices, for in-person payments;
- Provide comprehensive reporting and audit trails suitable for reconciliation, financial reporting, and external audit review.