Lessons From Being Lost - Swipe That Card!

Yesterday I had a scheduled appointment with a winery here in Southern California (Temecula, CA). A very rare thing happened on the way there - I got lost! I mean really really lost; I arrived at the winery over 1.5 hours late! Turns out there are two streets of the same name with freeway off ramps four miles a part. I took the first exit an I should have taken the second.

When I arrived at the winery the gentleman I was to meet with was gone. By the way did I mention I had left my cell phone at the office? Any way, I went into the tasting room to drop off a folder. Once inside I realized it would be foolish, after such a stressful and long drive, to not at least taste the wine at this beautiful winery. So that is exactly what I did; tasting six wines and soaking up the peaceful aura of the place near sunset.

Each time I went to the tasting bar to refill my class a nice and knowledgeable woman named Vicki would educate me on the the various wine clubs they have. She started high with their VIP club and then working her way down to the least expensive club. By the time I was though I had signed up for one of the clubs and left with three bottles of wine.

While going through this process I was closely watching how the transaction was occurring. Was Vicki going to enter all the data that would give the winery the lowest rates for credit card processing? Sadly the answer was no. I filled out a paper form for the club and she keyed in the transaction instead of swiping my credit card! Not a big deal for one transaction; it cost an addition $.17 (there is a .31% surcharge for keyed in credit cards). However, if you multiply that times 1000 you have an additional $170 a month in fees and over $2000 for the year. It does not stop there; if the zip code I wrote in the form did not match what my bank had on record this transaction would have gone to a category call EIRF and raised the fee .76% or $.41.

With all these numbers I am throwing out I am assuming there merchant account is straight pass through . If they have “mid-qualified” and “non-qualified” categories on there merchant account the extra fees would be much more than above.

So I learned two lessons from my adventure to Temecula, CA:

1. Read your directions and maps throughly before heading out on a journey - even if you have only been lost once in the last five years.
2. Make sure your merchants are swiping credit cards whenever possible. Never assume they are have the rules of credit card qualifying down pat.

Well that is my story for the day; you have yourself a wonderful weekend.

Oh, I almost forgot, if you would like to see the area I just wrote about here is a website to visit: Temecula Wines.

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