FAQ
How soon will I get my money?
It depends. Some processors take 48 hours or more after you batch out your terminal. Others make you wait for Discover or American Express to send you your money.
HERE IS WHAT WE DO: if you batch your terminal by 6 pm we will have the money in your bank the next morning. We will do that for all four major cards: Visa, MasterCard, Discover and American Express.
How do I know that I am getting a good deal? I hear that there is a lot of bait and switch in the credit card processing business.
We view ourselves as consultants. We know what we are talking about, as opposed to a salesperson who knows enough to be dangerous. What seems to be “Bait and Switch” is usually an inexperienced salesperson who makes sincere promises that he is unable to deliver on.
Is there a contract?
Of course there is! Would you trust someone to handle a large portion of your business receipts without a contract?
OK, but how long am I locked in for?
The industry standard is 36 months. Most agreements have a reasonable cancellation fee. Some do not, some have HUGE cancellation fees.
We have a 36 month agreement with a modest cancellation fee.
What does it cost?
The credit card issuer charges fees known as “Interchange”. See the links below for actual Interchange tables. These fees make up the major portion of what you pay to accept credit and debit cards.
Note: You will find that Visa’s table is by far the easiest to understand!
Visa: http://usa.visa.com/merchants/operations/interchange_rates.html
MasterCard: http://www.mastercard.com/us/merchant/support/interchange_rates.html
Discover http://www.discovernetwork.com/home/data/acqIntchgPricingVerify.html
What other fees are there?
Fee: Interchange Markup
Your processor (hopefully you will decide that we should be your processor!) is in business to make a profit. To that end he will add fees on to Interchange. Those fees are often presented in a myriad of ways. Suffice to say that you will pay Interchange plus a mark-up . As a rule, the higher your volume the lower the markup. It is guaranteed that you will never pay less than the actual cost of interchange.
Pease see the question above “How do I know that I am getting a good deal?”
Fee: Transaction Fee
This fee is either charged up front or bundled into your quoted “rate”. Sometimes the fee is called a Watts fee, item fee, access fee or even an authorization fee. This fee should match the number of actual transactions that you have.
Fee: Statement fee
This covers the overhead of having a Service Center that takes your phone calls and prepares a monthly statement for you.
PCI Compliance fee
Please see our PCI section for a more detailed consideration of this fee.
Annual Fee
This fee is charged by some processors. Their explanation is: Why not?
Returns fee
This fee is charge when you credit a card. This fee should be no more than a transaction fee.
Beware: some merchants are actually CHARGED another discount when crediting a card.
The card brands issue a credit to the processor when a card is credited. That refund belongs to you, make sure you get it.
Monthly minimum discount
Many processors charge this. It is not a big deal if you are busy 12 months of the year. If you are a small merchant and do not process cards during a slow season, you will feel this fee. Ask to have it waived.
Chargeback and Retrieval fees
These are legitimate fees, but are sometimes abused.
Voice authorization fees:
Sometimes a terminal will say “Call for authorization”. This message often means that a card is near its limit. You will be charged this fee (about $1.00) whether you are given an authorization number or not.
NOTE: The transaction will downgrade to the most expensive rate you have. Your customer may face a penalty fee as well.
Recommendation: Do yourself and your customer a favor, ask for another card.
Other Fees
Check your statement regularly for new fees.
