3 Questions to Ask When Choosing a Credit Card Processor

If you are running a business that deals with sales and purchases, there might arise situations where you need to choose a new credit card processor, but it is not as easy as it seems. It is a big decision and before making a final call you should be aware of certain things, like Fee charged and contract, customer service department and cost-effective tool. Do the comparison, study the market and then make the final decision. Let us now discuss the 3 questions you should ask your new credit card processor before finalizing it:

Structure of Fee Charged

When you opt for such tools, you are charged with a certain amount of fee, but it is important to know what exactly those fees are, more commonly called breakage of the fee. The fact is that most of the high-risk merchants have no idea about the process and end up paying a high amount of fee without actually knowing the hidden high markups in their pricing structure. To process the transaction, an interchange part of pricing structure is paid to the card issuer. Apart from this, there is an extra fee that they put on the top of it to gain more profit. So, when you are applying for new credit card processor/merchant payment processor, request them to separate out the interchange fee so that you can have a clear idea about how much money they are making or charging you in total.

Contract and Time Duration

Whenever a merchant wants to opt for a new credit card processor, he/she needs to sign a contract, which will lock you with them for certain period of time. It is important for high-risk merchants to check for options when shopping around for new processor and also to finalize the processor with shorter time duration instead of multi-year contracts. The advantage of choosing a short-term contract is:

• They will work hard for your business to impress you so that you renew the contract instead of shopping for new credit card processor or merchant payment processor once the contract expires. If you end up signing a multi-year contract, you will soon be forgotten and ignored and service quality provided may deteriorate.
  
  
• If any serious problem arises and you have a short-term contract or non-existing contract, immediate help will be provided to resolve the issue so as to retain you as a customer, whereas, if you have a long-term contract, it might take some time to resolve the issue you are facing.
  
  
• If you are not happy with the services provided to you by your current credit card processor, you can try out the new processor, which can meet your needs, but if you have a long-term contract, you have no option than sticking with the same provider until and unless your contract expires.

Customer Service Department

Efficient and knowledgeable customer service department is like icing on the cake. Get the opinion of the current customers of the credit card processor and find out about their experiences with the customer service department.Look for the processor whose,

• Support representatives are knowledgeable and can tackle any kind of issue if arises.
• Call waiting time is minimum
• Support representative should be able to resolve issues in the first call and in shortest time duration.

If you are lucky enough and end up buying a credit card processor or merchant payment processor for your high-risk business that fulfills all your needs and the fee charged is worth every single penny you pay, hold on tight to it and never let it go. If you are happy with the services provided and the fee charged, it would be a good decision to renew the contract with the same provider than starting the process all over again.