Hey! I used to work for this company!

Concord to process McPlastic payments

Concord EFS Inc. of Memphis will handle credit and debit card payments for fast-food giant McDonald's Corp.

Late last month, McDonald's unveiled plans to accept plastic for payment at about a quarter of its 13,300 restaurants by the middle of next year with speed as one motivation.

Concord will process the transactions under the agreement disclosed Tuesday. A pilot program will start Dec. 17, said Edward Labry III, Concord's president.

Labry declined to say how much the deal could add to the company's revenues or profits. But, he said, McDonald's restaurants handle about 22 million cash transactions each day and he estimated 15 to 20 percent of those could become credit or debit card payments in three to five years.

Labry said Concord plans to get credit and debit card payments set up in the 2,000 company-owned McDonald's stores as quickly as possible and to have all the franchise locations on the network by the end of 2003.

"And I'll tell you one thing," Labry said, "this is a lot better deal than that e-business thing we tried to set up a couple of years ago. You remember that? That crap with those young smart-asses sleeping in their cubes all day - you remember those little sons of bitches? My God, I hated those kids. Four-hour lunches, two-hour coffee breaks, coming and going as they please. And they looked at all sorts of bullshit on the internet! Downloading songs and things!"

"And that shit they called comedy," Labry continued, "that wasn't funny. I saw it after they all quit and left us hanging, and it wasn't funny at all."