Credit card payments or transactions are the future of the purchaser and salesman relationship. Nowadays more and more people are using credit cards to secure payments and to buy various goods and services. If you want to make your own business or enterprise successful you will have to integrate a credit card payment method into it. For this you will have to select the proper credit card processing supplies.
Before purchasing any sort of credit card processing supplies you have to find out what sort of solution your business requires. Each solution will need specific credit card processing supplies for its implementation. There are five main types of solutions. They are: the Phone Solution, the PC Desktop Solution, the E-commerce Solution, the Retail Credit Machine and the Custom Built Point of Sale (POS) Terminals.
In the Phone solution the system will usually need a dedicated phone line just for one terminal as the required credit card processing supplies. Usually nowadays you can find terminals that are capable of dual processing via broadband or telephone so that you will be free to use the phone line unhindered at anytime.
The PC Desktop Solution will utilize a software program that can be installed on a PC, as the credit card processing supplies. This software will be connecting behind a credit card processors firewall so that you can enter a transaction onto the software that will be processed. This method is used for call centers and enterprises that need recurring billing.
For the E-Commerce solution you can use either a third-party credit card processor or an actual merchant account processor. Here, since the entire operation is done online, the transaction can be conducted via an email. It can be even more complex, if you decide to setup a business website with shopping carts and certified gateways.
The Retail Credit machine is a common method seen and used by many consumers in retail outlets. Here you will be using small portable debit or credit card swipe terminals as the credit card processing supplies. These terminals have a variety of connection methods; including phone lines, DSL internet and even cellular networks.
Custom Built Point of Sales (POS) systems are expensive and are used by only wealthy enterprises. Here the credit card processing supplies are specialized POS or kiosks that are specifically designed for your business and to accept only the specific transactions that your business wants handled.
After figuring out the correct solution for you and purchasing the selected credit card processing supplies, you will have to contact a credit card processing company or a bank in order to set up merchant application services for your credit card transactions. Before selecting and finalizing your processing company make sure that their services are compatible with the credit card processing supplies you purchased earlier.
Remember…always keep up to date with merchant account fraud and credit card fraud education! Please see the following to help advise about credit card fraud and merchant account fraud and how you can avoid the issue:
PCI | FBI | FTC | Stop Fraud .gov | HG | USA.gov | DOJ | SS | FFIEC | CSOS
Contact us anytime with your merchant processing questions.
