by Edwin Ivanauskas | Tags: Banking

Your business is new and doing well. You have the state of the art equipment in your store. A new computer, latest software and alarm systems that will prevent theft. A customer walks up to the counter to make her first purchase. She has no cash and wants to pay by credit card. You don’t have a credit card machine and she has not brought any cash with her. You have just lost a sale for no reason at all. Credit cards are a major part of how we pay for things in our lives. They are quick to use and let’s face it most people would rather use their debit credit cards than cash. If it gets stolen then they can report it and that money is still theirs. If someone steals or robs you of your cash then you are out of luck. With a credit or debit card consumers have instant access to their bank account and to their money which if you are able to process credit cards in your business, then you will be the one making the money and the consumer will be able to spend more.

Picking a credit card processing service may seem like a giant task for you to deal with but it’s not if you know what to look for. A credit card processing service gives you many options including being able to take credit card payments on site of your business and online. Having the ability to take a credit card payment or debit card payment can triple your business.

Things to look for when choosing a credit card processing service is that if you will have to purchase the equipment to take payments, or if you will only be able to lease it through the credit card processing service. Does the credit card processing center charge a set up fee or not? Most companies will offer some type of incentives for new customers.

Verify that if you want to upgrade your service to not only take payments in your store but also on the internet or over the phone that you will be able to. Check to find out what types of fee's the credit card processing service will charge you on a monthly basis. Are you going to be billed based on the total amount of money collected or a percentage of the activity based either in the positive or negative amount collected. In other words will you be penalized and charged extra for any disputes? These are called merchant account fees and they are based on visa and master card usually based on the sales.

You will be billed usually anywhere from twenty cents and up for each transaction. At the end of each night you will have to print out a settlement report based on all transactions from the day. You should always be able to receive twenty four hour help if needed.

When picking your credit card processing service center verify that the interest rates will stay through the length of your contract and that you are not being overcharged for each transaction. Last, enjoy watching your business grow from using a credit card processing service.

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