Why the monthly fee for PCI Non-Compliance? How to Avoid it?

Explanation of the PCI non-compliance charges.

Monthly Fee and How to Avoid it

PCI, or Payment Card Industry, includes major card brands like Visa, Mastercard, Discover, American Express, and JCB. They've set up comprehensive security rules, the PCI Data Security Standards (PCI DSS), to protect card information in transactions.

Your participation is crucial as your software's payment solution, partnered with Fullsteam (UnifiedPay), helps gather and report compliance to these brands. As a card data handler, annual validation of adherence is necessary. You can choose Security Metrics for this, but it's not obligatory. 

When you partner with your software's payment solution, the responsibility falls on UnifiedPay to ensure that your payment processing adheres to these security standards.

• The $29.95 non-compliance fee emerges when either evidence of compliance is lacking or certain mandated measures aren't in place. This fee, in turn, gets passed on to you as a merchant.
  • To prevent incurring this fee, you need to submit an Attestation of Compliance and complete a Self-Assessment Questionnaire. Quarterly scans are essential too, finding and addressing security gaps.