Web Payments Working Group Draft Charter Review

Hi All,

I’ve reviewed the charter and have attached my thoughts for your consideration.  I’ve tried where possible also not to repeat feedback already submitted by others unless there was some additional context. Please let me know if there is anything I can clarify or questions that may arise.

General Comments

  *   Remove the term architecture from the title of the WG.  In line with others comments here, I believe that framing the WG as a “Web Payments Working Group” would allow the WG to focus on a more holistic view of web-payments as opposed to just those dealing with Architecture

Section 1 – Goals

  *   In the opening sentence the phrase “from a Web site or Web application. Where practical the standards will be usable by native applications/apps.” feels like it couples/centers the WG’s work too closely to a particular type of user agent.  Trying to distinguish between web applications or native applications may draw attention away from WG outputs which should be application/user-agent agnostic.  Ideally, the work of the WG would result in a generic approach to standard messages and interfaces which could then be implemented by different stakeholders as part of the work to show that they work across different user agents/client (ex. web app, web service, native app, backend server process etc).  As a suggestion for replacement, something like "Under this initial charter, the Working Group defines standards that ease integration of the payments ecosystem into the Web and allows for payers to initiate payments in a consistent way across user-agents and applications that they interact with.”
  *   For the sentence The W3C is also planning other Working Groups to develop standards that will facilitate payments on the Web, on topics such as security.”, recommend also adding identity and credentials, commerce (ex. loyalty, coupons, discounts, offers, etc). Also, it would be good to add a statement here that it is expected that the WG will be expected to interact with these other WG’s and that work will be coordinated on an ongoing basis via the Web Payments IG.  A draft of this might read: “Due to the nature of payments on the Web, the Web Payments WG is one of several WG’s that will be be coordinated by the Web Payments IG on an ongoing, regular basis to ensure that standards developed as part of the Web Payments WG are interoperable with those developed in other related WG’s (ex. Web Commerce) that may be working in parallel.

Section 2 – Scope

  *   For the Note: "Note: W3C expects to a wider variety of of eCommerce scenarios over time, including digital receipts; loyalty programs and coupons; peer-to-peer payments; and harmonization of user experience in-browser, in-app, and in-store. For more information, see the Payments Use Cases<http://www.w3.org/TR/web-payments-use-cases/> published by the W3C Web Payments Interest Group.” This appears as if it is suggesting that this work may eventually fall into scope of the Web Payments WG. We should be more explicit here as to where the “Commerce” work is to be handled.  In IG discussions, having a parallel “Web Commerce WG” working along side the “Web Payments WG” would help to decouple the work efforts to allow for both to progress independently, but in a coordinated fashion.

Section 2.1  - Wallets

  *   It would be useful in this section to illustrate how the term “Wallet” (or any user agent for that matter) may use a set of standardized Web Payment API’s to accomplish it’s work and focus more attention on the API’s/Interfaces than the “Wallet".  In thinking back on the many discussions that the group has had around the term “Payment Agent” and “Wallet”, I believe that a focus on the API/Interface vs. the name/concept of the type of user-agent (ex. Wallet, Payment Agent, POS terminal, etc) would be helpful in keeping the focus on a standard set of messages that can be used regardless of whether they start on a particular “kind” of endpoint.  This would allow for the same Web Payment standard to do things like “issue a refund” to a “wallet”, or send money from a “wallet” to “wallet”.  This would also make it easier for organizations to use the standard to do things like paying their employees or suppliers from a “payroll system” to an “account” which would in turn increase adoption.

Section 3.1 – Web Transactions 1.0

  *   For “Web Payment Initiation” there appears to be some missing context.
     *   Are payer’s user-agents expected to be able to “receive” a request for payment as part of response received back from Payee’s web application with payment context?
     *   Also, the second statement here around "to pass back to the payee” may not align with the security/privacy goals for the payers payment information as stated in the IG’s goals/benefits.  Is the statement here to suggest that the user agent will send payment confirmation (or notification that the payment has been initiated” to the payees application?

Section 4.1 – W3C Groups

  *   Should we add CG’s or Notes related to other charters that are likely in flight here (ex. Identity and Credentials WG)? It would be helpful to illustrate how these may interact with the Web Payments WG as defined

Section 7 – Decision Policy

  *   Open question: How is the ongoing work of the WG influenced by the IG? Given the coordination of work that may likely be required across other related areas (ex. Identity/Credentials, Commerce, Security Etc.), is there expected to be longer term engagement of the IG with the WG? If so, how is that reflected here?

Hope this helps.

Pat







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