Credit cards payment

[sebastian]

If you are an online shop owner, you can boost your online sales if you include credit card as one payment option. However you have to apply for a merchant account to be able to implement your own credit card payment or use a third payment processor .


Any recommendations on how you set up a credit card payment on your site?

 

[SysOp]

It isn’t that difficult to accept credit card payments on your website.


First of all you will need to decide if you want your own merchant account or if you want to use a 3rd party processor.


If you go for a 3rd party processor then it might be much easier but it is typically also more expansive, the common 3rd party payment processors are 2co, metacharge and clickbank.


To go with your own merchant account you will need some more work to do, first you will need to find a MSP / ISO which can help you to open the merchant account, this is needed, almost any MSP and ISO has already partnered up with a payment gateway. It is different from region to region what the best solution is for you, for instant if you life in the US you have thousands of ISO´s and MSP’s available and often you get processing rates for 2 – 3% without a monthly fee or setup fee, in Europe for instant it is more expansive due to interchange fees, you should expect a processing rate in the range of 3 to 5%.


Once you got approved to become a Merchant Account you will need to integrate your website with a payment gateway, as already mentioned, this is something your merchant account provider will be able to help with. The integration is often done through a plug in for the CMS or Shopping Cart you are using or simply by some minor programming, which can be done in a few hours. You will need to choice between a secure payment forms which is hosted on the payment gateway’s server or to integrate through some XML API, the last one is the most complicated and isn’t a solution for merchants doing only a low volume. An XML API means that your customers the card holder will stay on your website and key in the credit card information. The Secure Payment form will redirect the card holder to the payment gateway for them to enter the credit card information.


Now it depends on your business case, the monthly turnover you might have and where your business is located, to find the right solution.


For the US it is common to use Authorize.net as payment gateway, and you will find thousands of ISO’s which can help you to become a Merchant Account to be used with Authorize.net.


For Europe, I would suggest you of course the services of CCLOGIC.Com they have solutions for merchants from World Wide and can help with almost any business case.

 

[megamath]

Another explanation of what a payment gateway is, beside authorize net you also have First Data and other larger payment gateways available.