For you guys that accept credit cards...couple of questions.

[blykins]

Our credit card processing company yanks us for anywhere between 2.1-4% depending on what credit card we run, then charges us a flat $20/month fee.

They seemed to leave out the fine print when we first contacted them. It was supposed to have been a 2.1% fee, then all of a sudden it became government, corporate, and overseas cards are 4%.

Anyone out there in engine builder land have a company that's offering better deals?

[David Redszus]

Once upon a time, credit card processing companies would call about once a week looking for business.
Recently, they have not called very much. But processing fees are very negotiable. You can shop around and find better deals. Don't be afraid to tell a credit card processing company that you have found a better deal and ask that they either match it or better it. Don't be afraid to move your business.

[wbclassics]

Our credit card processing company yanks us for anywhere between 2.1-4% depending on what credit card we run, then charges us a flat $20/month fee.

They seemed to leave out the fine print when we first contacted them. It was supposed to have been a 2.1% fee, then all of a sudden it became government, corporate, and overseas cards are 4%.

Anyone out there in engine builder land have a company that's offering better deals?

I've been thinking strongly about this as well, especially once you consider website gateway integration with an existing merchant account adds about another flat $25-$30 month to the total. So you end up in the area of flat $60/mo plus the % fees per card. I also hate these PCI compliance regulations. No longer is it considered safe to accept a credit card from a customer online (even with the data encrypted) and stored on a private server. They've essentially forced you to go with one of the online gateway processing companies or risk having your merchant account terminated if they find out you're storing customer CC data on a private server (read: not one of thiers).

I'm strongly considering going to PayPal for processing. They offer a merchant account that allows both onsite and website gateway processing for a total of $30/month. The card processing rates are higher than we pay now (2.9%) BUT, we have a PayPal debit card that provides 1.5% cash back on purchases made that draw the funds from our PayPal account. So that would drop the effective percentage rate. The online gateway is not as flexible as being able to recieve a web order with the customer's data and then processing it onsite with the physical equipment. The PayPal percentage rates drop also with the volume of your transactions, the tiers are given on their website.

Kai

[Keith Morganstein]

The card processing rates are higher than we pay now (2.9%) BUT, we have a PayPal debit card that provides 1.5% cash back on purchases made that draw the funds from our PayPal account. So that would drop the effective percentage rate.
Kai

Interesting, never really considered the paypal debit card, but this is worth checking into.

[Y BE AVG]

Tell them your going to switch providers and watch your rates drop.

[Dave Koehler]

I used to get a decent rate but since everything hit the fan I have been watching it increase at an alarming rate. A phone call did nothing so I am studying alternatives myself.
I have been considering having paypal handle it all. Still crunching numbers but it doesn't look like it's going to cost any more overall than it does now. As for website sales with paypal I haven't figured out what to do about item weights and UPS.

Ecommerce: Since I have taken cards in the normal manner for years I chose Americart.com to handle the go between work and card security for the web site. Another expense in the chain but it gives me great latitude in how I do things. No issues with them at all in this regard. Just a flat fee no matter the amount or quantity you sell.

Never understood why a Visa from England cost me more than a Visa from Utah.
I wish I knew how not to accept those darn rewards card or cash back cards. They rip us big for that privilege also

[JonKaase]

we had a girl come in and change our service to the one she represents, and it should save us money. I think it's 1.96 percent. I can get her # for you. She changed over most of our street!. ... Kaase

[Dave Koehler]

I hope that works out Jon. Let us know in 6 months.
I have had some gal pestering me about switching. The more I listened the more I was backing away. They used the same spiel as medical insurance salesmen. "I'm in the Hood, can I stop by and show you my flashy pinky ring that I bought with the money I saved with this company?"
A little digging lead me to believe they are a reseller kind of deal. They claimed to be located in a nearby town but their website was one of those boiler plate sites with addresses no where near local.
I couldn't get them to show me any of the fine print or refer me to someone that was using them for more than 6 months. End of story for me.

Remember MCI telephone company? Kind of a early dot com of the phone industry. This was back just after all the phone companies got busted up. They did that ridiculously low deal and I went for it. Turned out that it tripled my phone bill. Tons of mysterious charges after the fact, etc. Played Hell getting out of that one. I finally just told them to sue me. I didn't care anymore. Guess I have never had any good come out of a cold call sales pitch.

[ZIGGY]

There are many, many people peddling card service. It is difficult to price shop your bottom line cost because there are so many different charge factors applied to your transactions. Several things to watch out for: lots of these processing companies will low-ball their initial price to you and then jack the rates a few months in. They will also bone you with
requirements to lease or buy processing equipment from them. Finally, don't sign a contract binding you to them until
death do you part.

[2.2=8]

There are many, many people peddling card service. It is difficult to price shop your bottom line cost because there are so many different charge factors applied to your transactions. Several things to watch out for: lots of these processing companies will low-ball their initial price to you and then jack the rates a few months in. They will also bone you with
requirements to lease or buy processing equipment from them. Finally, don't sign a contract binding you to them until
death do you part.

Be VERY, VERY, careful; eight years ago my office manager (wife) was shopping for better rates on our card proccessing; signed a contract with a regional company, turned out to be the begining of a legal nightmare that eventually involved the State attorney General of several states, The Federal Trade Commission, and the U.S. Justice Dept.
The short version of the story is that the credit card proccessing industry is largly run by organized crime. With the help of our attorney friend we stonewalled the gangster company long enough to run out the statute of limitations and stop their legal claims against us.
We were fortunate to have caught on to the scam early enough to lock our bank accounts, many other small businesses were not.
I dont have time now to explain the whole deal, Just remember NOT to sign any ccd proccessing agreement until you read all the fine print, the devil is in the details. These crooks have litrally hundreds of bussiness names in every state and they are still in operation.
Also, If they want you to sign a lease agreement to use their equipment red flags should go up! Stick with major household name companies. We finally got set up with GM credit net through AC Delco and all is well.