Video: Are Early Termination Penalties Really That Bad?

Watch this video to here a different poi of view on merchant account early termination penalties. Let us know what you think by sharing your thoughts in the comment section below.

Video: Merchant Accounts - What to Look For and Ask About

Watch this video and read this post to learn what to look for and ask when you are shopping for a merchant account.

What watch out for:
Super low discount rates – the lower the advertised rate is the greater your effective rate typically will be.
Free terminals or gateways – in business nothing is free in the [...]

Video - BE WARNED! Early Termination Fees and Auto-Renewal

Watch this video to be warned about the dangers that lurk in many merchant account contracts. The focus of this lesson is on early termination fees and contract auto renewal. If you heed these words you can save yourself a lot of money and suffering.

What is Straight Pass Through - Video

If you would like to lower your merchant account fees by switching to a “straight pass through” account go here, fill out the short form and we’ll have you saving money in no time.
If you would like us to analyze your current merchant account and show you how much a “straight pass through” merchant account [...]

The Basics of PCI Compliance

By John Robinson, of Cocard Synergy

Before I get to the meat of the matter, let me finish what I began last week. It bugged me that I only knew what TJ Maxx was supposed to be fined, so I went and found out what they were fined. Rather than the roughly $100 per [...]

How Do Merchant Accounts Work?

Credit card processing seems simple enough.  However, there are lots of moving parts behind the scenes. Here is a simplified, step by step list that reveals the whole process:
Authorization
1. Your customer presents their credit card (or the card number, expiration date and security code) to you or your employee.
2. You swipe the card or key [...]

Where do Processing Fees Come From? Pt. 2

By John Robinson, of Cocard Synergy
For the remainder of this discussion, I’ll discuss interchange fees and then a little about the fees to the merchant account provider.  The assessment fees paid to the associations, both being small and not negotiable, can wait for another day.
Interchange fees usually make up roughly 80% of the fees you [...]

Where do Processing Fees Come From? Pt. 1

By John Robinson, of Cocard Synergy
For the really short answer, check out Who Gets Your Merchant Account Fees?
Here’s the plain ‘ol short answer:
Originally these fees were created to cover the cost of processing for your customer’s bank (the “issuing bank ”), and to make small profit for the bank giving you your money (the “acquiring [...]

Where do all those fees go?

Adam J. Levtin , a professor Georgetown Law School, recently wote a real easy to understand article about who all the fees assocated with a merchant account go to at CreditSlips .  Here is an excerpt:
"Here’s the deal. You purchase $100.00 of goods at a merchant on a credit card. The merchant receives $100 minus [...]

Who Get’s Your Merchant Account Fees?

The Biggest Chunk:  The Issuing Bank (the bank that “issued” your customer’s their credit card)
This part of your fees are called “Interchange.”  Depending on the type of business, size of transaction and type used these fees range between 1.03% and 2.70% plus transaction fees of $0 to $0.15.
Next: Visa or MasterCard (the associations)
These are called [...]

The Three Price Points of a Merchant Account

How challenging can managing a merchant account be? I review 5 – 10 merchant account statements each week and almost everyone one starts out looking like it is written in a foreign language!  Some statements have fees from three separate months!  Other statements are extremely vague and seem to be intentionally hiding information.  So the [...]

Who is the “Issuing Bank?”

The Issuing Bank is the financial institution that extends credit to a card holder through credit card accounts. The financial institution issues a credit card and bills the card holder for purchases against the bankcard account.
Here is wikipedia’s defenition for Issuing Bank .

Who and What is the “Aquiring Bank?”

An acquiring bank (or acquirer ) is the bank or financial institution that accepts payments for the products or services on behalf of a merchant. The term acquirer indicates that the bank accepts or acquires transactions performed using a credit card issued by a bank other than itself.
The acquiring bank’s contract with the merchant is [...]

Let’s Get Rid of Your EIRF!

If you are seeing a Visa transaction category named “EIRF” on your merchant account statement you are probably paying much more in discount fees than you need to. If you do not know what EIRF is, read this post and then come back: What is EIRF?
So how do we get rid of EIRF? [...]

What is a Merchant Account Downgrade?

A downgrade occurs when a transaction fails to meet certain pre-defined criteria from Visa or MasterCard, and an additional charge is added to the discount rate for processing the transaction.