Domain Entertainment's Domain Point of Sale software is currently PABP / PA-DSS (Payment Application Best Practices / Payment Application Data Security Standard) certified until 09/30/2009 (at which time DPOS must be recertified or the PCI SSC will recommend that the existing software not be distributed to NEW customers).

Applications, such as DPOS, are no longer required to be listed on the PABP / PA-DSS website as certified and Domain Entertainment, in opposition to the new PA-DSS requirement that payment of $1,250.00 be submitted yearly just to be listed on a website, in addition to the serveral thousands of dollars in certification fees, will instead inform users of the PABP / PA-DSS status of the Domain Point of Sale software here on the Domain Entertainment website.

PABP, originally enacted by Visa, is being taken over by an entity calling itself the Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) and will be called PA-DSS as of October 1, 2008 at which time the PABP list of certified applications that used to appear for no charge on the Visa website will be removed that website and will then appear on the PCI SSC website for those companies willing to pay out $1,250.00 to be listed on the website.

Prior to stating Domain Entertainment's opposition to this entire scheme, be aware that the information below will not be describing much more than what has already been stated on the internet in several places. You can type in "PCI SSC", "PABP", or "PA-DSS" into your favorite search engine and find plenty of others giving the same information and more. For even more interesting reading, do a web search for "credit card hackers" and determine for yourself who you think PABP / PA-DSS protects.

Domain Entertainment has been opposed the PABP / PA-DSS scheme from its inception due to its lack of cost regulation by Visa and now by PCI SSC. Certification under the scheme must be done either Annually (or Bi-Annually if submitting a report of no change) at a fee ranging from several thousand to tens of thousands of dollars. Certification providors are unregulated and may charge whatever fee they see fit and application providers who provide solutions to small and medium sized businesses such a Domain Entertainment are charged the same fees as huge corporate web based auction sites, what may be considered pocket change for these huge corporations is a significant amount of revenue for smaller companies like Domain Entertainment.

Let me first describe what it takes to get the software from a company to the customer and then tell you how PABP / PA-DSS fits in.

1. First, the software company must request current operating specifications from whatever processor they wish to support (such as FDMS, Global, Paymentech, ECHO, etc.) - this is who actually takes the credit card information you put into the software and tells you whether the transaction is approved or not.

2. The software company then spends many man hours writing the software to meet those specifications prior to application testing.

3. Once the software meets the specifications, the processor (FDMS, etc. as above) requires that the software go through application testing to insure that the data is being sent correctly and that everything works. The processor will not certify the application on their network until it is working correctly and passes their application testing procedures.

4. Any time a change in the software is made which affects the data transmission, it must go back through this software application testing, this must be done individually for every processor that the software supports (Domain Point of Sale supports 8 credit card processors and 5 check guarantee processors).

5. There are also card industry rules that must be followed as far as what card information can be stored on your computer and displayed on receipts.

At this point the software can normally be sold to the customer for use, however, a couple of years ago Visa began requiring PABP certification which requires that companies pay thousands of dollars to a 3rd party company to basically come and retest what has already been tested.

What does PABP / PA-DSS do for you? In my opinion, under the guise of protecting your data and your customers, what it really does is give credit card companies additional insulation from liability. I believe PABP / PA-DSS was probably created in response to the ongoing news stories of hackers stealing and downloading millions of credit card numbers.

I also believe that most of the rules enacted by credit card companies in the last several years have only made it more difficult for merchants to be able to defend against chargebacks and fraudulent charges than ever before as well as made it more difficult for software companies to keep up with their ever increasing demands and now ever increasing fees, but you are encouraged to research this on your own and come to your own conclusions.

The bottom line here is that Domain Entertainment provides an affordable PC software solution to small and home based businesses. Unlike web based processing solutions, there is no additional monthly fee to use the Domain Point of Sale software which can help small businesses save hundreds of dollars each year in unnecessary fees.

The Domain Point of Sale product has never been on the list of applications that store sensitive cardholder data nor has it ever been considered a high risk application. That's because it stores all transaction information on your local PC, not at a source on the internet, and that transaction information is stripped of all but minor, allowable identifying information (such as the last few digits of a card number), transactions are sent via phone line or via the internet using secure software communication libraries written by the internet processor themself, not by Domain Entertainment.