January 20, 2016  

Purdue Profiles: Debbie Wert

Debbie Wert Purdue Profiles

Debbie Wert is an e-commerce and payment card analyst in the Office of Treasury and Operations. She is responsible for University-wide merchant card and e-commerce service activities, related data security, implementations and conversions. (Purdue University photo/Mark Simons)
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Paying for goods or services with the click of a mouse or swipe of a card is an easy action that most people do every day, without thinking. However, Debbie Wert, e-commerce and payment card analyst for the University, knows that there is a lot more to the simple click or swipe than meets the eye.

Wert, a Purdue graduate, works with every campus under the Purdue umbrella to ensure that customers have a seamless experience when paying online or in person. Her tasks can include anything from finding new ways to implement e-commerce to working with merchants and their vendors to deploy new equipment to process transactions using the new chip card technology. The embedded microchips, usually visible on the front of the card, are a recent addition to U.S. payment cards.  

What do you do as an e-commerce and payment card analyst?

My position centers on working with merchant areas at all campuses to ensure that existing and new implementations of payment card acceptance, via e-commerce or in-person transactions not only meet the business needs of our customers but also are compliant with current Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard. My merchant base consists of more than 100 areas that accept payment cards for goods and services provided by the University. This ranges from tuition and fees, donations, events, merchandise and ticket sales, dining, student life and a host of other essential missions of the University. 

Examples of recent projects include new e-commerce payment card applications related to Purdue Day of Giving and the "Ever True" campaign, NanoHub, Graduate Admissions, Parking Facilities, and activities within the colleges of Agriculture and Education and at the regional campuses. I am also working on the deployment of new cellular terminals to over 15 University units including Convocations, Purdue Student Farm, Conferences and Development. 

What was your role with the Purdue Day of Giving and "Ever True" campaign?

As part of preparation for the annual Purdue Day of Giving and "Ever True" campaign, I had the honor of working with the University Development Office to implement e-commerce applications for payment card acceptance that integrate with our service provider’s payment processing gateway. This helps to ensure that card information our donors provide is not transmitted and stored on Purdue’s network, but entered into a compliant service provider's gateway for authorization and settlement. We have worked together to implement systems that are in ongoing use for one-time and recurring donations via the Web for all campuses. E-commerce systems that provide support for our outbound call center and for the actual Day of Giving events were also implemented. This was truly a team effort that continues to reap benefits for our donors and the University every day.

Does your work ever extend outside of Purdue?

I especially enjoy the opportunity to present to my peers in higher education the "best practices" we employ here at Purdue. Recently, I was honored to present about our success in using third-party vendors to give our merchants access to systems that provide secure and efficient practices for our needs in higher education at a Touchnet user's conference. Touchnet is the University's strategic partner for Web-based payment card acceptance. 

What is your favorite part of your work?    

I really enjoy being able to work with my customers to find and implement payment card acceptance solutions that will support their operations. Our merchant areas across all campuses are great partners to collaborate with! We all share the same mission to use effective and secure processes for accepting payment cards at the University. 

Writer: Megan Huckaby, 765-496-1325, mhuckaby@purdue.edu 

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