Which card payment company

[Sunnyone]

We are going to start excepting card payments and I was hoping someone would have a recommendation of who to use?

The payments will typically range from £6000-£10,000.

Thanks

[Mr Overheads]

How many £6k to £10k payments per month? And how are you going to want to accept them? Face to Face, over the phone, online?

Is it payment in advance with a long lead time (like Sofa's) or in arrears (like a restaurant)?

[Sunnyone]

Thanks Mr Overheads

There would be around 2-6 sales per week. The payment would be split with a 25% deposit being taken in advance of the work and the remainder paid about 3 week later. The payments would be taken over the phone.

Thanks

[jonby]

I would not take payments over the phone in a business like yours - the combination of deposit element, high average transaction value and low number of transactions means you are more exposed than most businesses to the effect of a chargeback (customer dispute) - one single chargeback would be a big hit

You need to either have customer present transactions (which means chip & pin) or online transactions which use 3d secure (the equivalent of chip & pin for online, which you may have seen as 'verified by visa'). In either instance, the risk transfers to the buyer. But for phone transactions, which by definition can't use either method, you can't shift the risk

We have a self imposed limit of £250 for phone transactions and the rest are taken online or customer present. Our theory is that it's more hassle to refuse all phone payments but if the odd one becomes a problem, it's only £250 against typical 6 figure turnover per month so it's very manageable risk

assuming customer present transactions are not possible, I'd go down the route of setting up a website with a payment section - it won't cost very much

There are lots of merchant service providers so you want to get quotes from 2 or 3 but ultimately, the bargaining power for bringing down the commission rates only comes in once you have an established transaction history

Debit cards are normally charged by the handlers in pence per transaction (15-30p) whilst credit cards are percentages (1-2%) which is why most merchants will chare no surcharge for debit cards but a %age surcharge for credit cards. Unless you are in a low average transaction value environment like a newsagents where they may charge for debit cards too. If your business is high margin, you probably wouldn't charge a fee for credit cards either, which is why travel agents & airlines tend to charge for credit cards but restaurants & fashion stores do not

hope this helps

[Mr Overheads]

jonby said:

Debit cards are normally charged by the handlers in pence per transaction (15-30p) whilst credit cards are percentages (1-2%)

This is no longer the case:
http://www.cardswitcher.co.uk/2014/10/uk-card-proc...

[jonby]

Mr Overheads said:

jonby said:

Debit cards are normally charged by the handlers in pence per transaction (15-30p) whilst credit cards are percentages (1-2%)

This is no longer the case:
http://www.cardswitcher.co.uk/2014/10/uk-card-proc...

You are correct, but I was trying not to complicate the issue. Firstly because it hasn't kicked in yet (with plenty as yet unknown) so I was going on what is currently happening and secondly, there will be a low level price cap that means %levels will be minimal for transactions at the level of the OP

But as I say, you are of course correct ! :-)

We still pay a pence per transaction on debit cards and suspect that won't change for quite some time (our mean average transaction level is c. £500)