how to find a right online credit card processor 1

[mikeali]

I need to find the right credit card processing company to charge my subscriber from my website. When I search over the web I get hundreds of them which I don’t know how to choose one. I heard there are many of them out there that are not the actual processor and they act like middle man which I don’t want to deal with those. Is there any way that I can find the actual processor with reasonable rates? I also would like to have a physical credit card machine to charge credit cards manually if I need to.

I appreciate if someone can give me some tips regarding my situation?

Thanks,

Mike

 

[mikeali]

Here is my next question:

Since I have my own shopping cart, what type of service should i look for? Basically all i need is to charge the credit card and then transfer the fund into my account. everyelse as far as programming goes i want to do it myself.

thx again.

 

[CoreyBryant]

Most processors have resellers that you go thru actually. Some of the larger processors are Cardservice, Nova, Echo, etc.

There are two components you need: a merchant account & an electronic payment gateway (LinkPoint, Authorizenet.com, Verisign e.g.).

With a merchant account provider (MAP), you can usually be looking at a discount rate of about 2.39%, a transaction rate of about $.30. Usually there is a monthy fee (customer service, statement, etc) of about $10-$30. Most have a monthly minimum - usually around $25. But as long as you are processing (usually) over $1,050, you will not be subject to that monthly minimum. This is usually dependent on the discount rate.

As far as the gateways, the fees are usually about $15-$30 a month. Some of the gateways will also change a transaction fee as well - usually $.10-$.15.

The LinkPoint payment gateway is probably one of the strongest out there. It is owned by the First Data Corporation. First Data has been doing electronic money transfers since 1871 and they were the first processor of both VISA® and MasterCard® bank-issued credit cards in 1976. First Data processed 12.2 billion transactions in North America alone in 2003. With a merchant account thru Carsdservice, there is no extra transaction costs involved.

Authorize.net is probably the most advertised electronic gateway. A lot of people think they can sign up with them and immediately start to accept credit cards. They do not release you need a merchant account as well. Authorize.net even uses the First Data platform to help facilitate transaction processing.

Verisign also has a payment gateway. Verisign is probably the most recognized name because they also offer other services and products for the internet (i.e. SSL certificates, domain registration, hosting, etc). You do not need to purchase everything from Verisign to have a successful e-commerce business.

All three gateways above will provide an API in which to capture & process credit card data on your secure webpage.

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[mikeali]

Corey, thank you very much for all these info.

You said I need a merchant account & an electronic payment gateway.

I don't exactly understand what they each do. By merchant account do you mean the credit card processing comany and by gateway do mean the secure connection?

What do you think about getting everything from VeriSign? Here is what they are offering me:

Discounted this holiday week: $2,595.00 - 2 yrs.
$1,395.00 - 1 yr.
Includes 1,000 FREE trx per mos, ea trx after that is just 10 cents.

What I don't like is paying them 1395 to get their service.

Can I get merchant account directly from First Data Corporation?

What would you recommend?

Thanks,

Mike

 

[CoreyBryant]

Think of the electronic gateway as the virtual likeness to the POS terminal in your local grocery store. It allows the connectivity between your website & and First Data or Visanet. A lot of gateway also use the First Data platform to help verify transactions.

From your pricing that is over $100 a month. What else are they offering you? Only the gateway? If so - that is way too expensive.

Actually - you really do not want to get a merchant account from First Data. Their gateway that they use is a scaled down version of LinkPoint & until they combine both - I do not recommend that gateway.

Besides - most processors are charging you abour 2.39% - so you are not paying anyone "extra" money where you could be saving something on something else.

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[mikeali]

VeriSign is providing credit card processing and gateway with that price. Expensive, huh?

Please help me out. Due to my limited budget I don't have enough money to pay big guys like VeriSign to give me one single package and charge me double for it.

Again all I need is to charge credit cards via my web sites for subscriptions. In addition I would like to have a credit card machine to charge credit cards manually if I need to. I do understand that I have to have a secure connection (SSL) which I know is aroudn 350/year from VeriSign.

What do think I should do?

 

[CoreyBryant]

Actually you can get an SSL a lot cheaper. You do not have to get anything from Verisign.

I do not really want to recommend one over the other (due to my sig) but it also depends on what you might be selling, volume, etc as well possibly do you need shooting, a shopping cart, etc?

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[mikeali]

It's a Dating website which will be open by 01/01/05. I don't exactly know how much traffic it goning to have but according to few competiotions that have out there my guess is 50 transactions per month in average. On the other hand I have a little small business running on the side which I do web hosting and graphic designs and I had cases that the client wanted to pay me via cc.

No shopping cart going on and all I do is charging fix amount of membership.

 

[CoreyBryant]

Dating websites are sometimes considered high risk because of the amount of chargebacks.

Right now it seems that alost your entire profit is going to Verisign. Plus don't sign up for the merchant account until about 12/15 - this should give you more than enough time (just in case). Usually to get approved - it takes only 1 - 2 business days.

Also mixing these two types of businesses might cause a few problems because there are two different business models.

If the dating website only is one amount (no recurring?) - you might have a good chance of getting one. I actually left a message for my business parnet also to see if a dating website is under computer & data services as well (this is what web design & hosting is classified under).

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[mikeali]

yes recurring! that's how all dating sites do. in addition there should be different combinations of subscriptions. like 1 month, 3 months, 6 months and so. Basically I'll wait just til 15th of december and apply for a marchant account then. but still don't know which one to pick.

 

[CoreyBryant]

Are you in the United States also?

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[mikeali]

Yes.
I'm in California and my corporation is registered in California.

 

[CoreyBryant]

It should be fairly simple. Due to the TOS - I really do not want to recommend one processor over the other but I think that you have some good references to base your search on?

__________________________
Corey

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/

http://www.merchantaccounts4less.com/promo/tek.asp

 

[piperent]

Let me jump in here. Sounds as if you are having a hard time making a decision, or you just don't know what you need. Why not take an hour or two, go to 'google' and search for 'internet credit card service'. There is a veritable plethora of search topics from different card services. Given a little bit of time and some general knowledge I'm sure you can answer a lot of your questions and get enough information to make that all important decision.

Good Luck
JP

 

[redhatvswin]

Decission is simple. As some people already mentioned, you need merchant account with bank, which your processor or gateway will happy to help you out. But, think this way. Ok, you get nice free trnx every month and small charges on additional trnx. However, VISA and MC requires standart charges and its usually depends on nature of issuer and acquirer. For example, if your customer paying with card issued by say for example Chinese bank, then retailer MUST pay 3 percent and in local or in region transactions it could be cheaper. So, decide what is the highest amount your customer will pay in one trnx? 100000's or just about 100 at most. So how they gonna pay up this. Usually banks do the payments on behalf of merchants and gateways. They will standart price, but how much will cost it to transfer these funds back to your own account??? tricky. So, its usually better open an account or use your own accoutn with existing bank and ask them to provide a gateway or processor for you. As far as I heard the best one in US is Innovant and Bank One.