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Payment Card Industry Compliance

Current security standards and compliance requirements reduce credit card fraud and help protect the security of your data.

Preventing fraud and data security

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard and Payment Card Industry (PCI) Compliance aims to reduce credit card fraud and the related financial losses resulting from theft of cardholder data.

The Government of Alberta has adopted the standard to ensure that all merchant services activities are conducted in a manner in which cardholder data is not stored, processed or transmitted in any electronic or physical Government of Alberta environment.

To comply with PCI requirements, the Government of Alberta has changed the process for accepting credit card payments to protect the security of cardholder data.

As of December 31, 2013, Alberta Transportation and Economic Corridors can no longer accept credit card numbers in any format by phone, fax, email or mail.

Processing payments

If you intend to submit a hardcopy application and pay by credit card, you can no longer include your credit card number on the application. Failure to comply with credit card processing procedures will result in the payment not being processed.

Note: The Government of Alberta accepts payment cards including credit cards and prepaid credit cards for Visa, MasterCard and American Express. Interac debit cards are not applicable.

To process a credit card payment Alberta Transportation and Economic Corridors may:

  • Redirect the call to an automated telephone interactive payment service that allows the client to submit a credit card payment. The client enters their cardholder data directly into the telephone keypad and receives a confirmation number upon successful transaction.
  • Send the client an email notification that contains a 'payment link' that allows the client to enter and submit a credit card payment via a secure payment page powered by TD Merchant Services. The client must have a valid email address.
  • Notify the client (in both scenarios) of the payment confirmation number upon completion of the transaction. The confirmation number may be required to be submitted with the application, service record or penalty.

Some applications and services are available for submission via an e-commerce service. For credit card payments processed online, the applicant is redirected to a secure payment page powered by TD Merchant Services.