How to take cards on our website

[billythered]

Hi all.

We are an established web sales only company and currently we only take paypal payments. While we have our own bespoke (phython based) website most of our customers came originally from ebay so use paypal. But we are now attracting first time purchasers to our website and need to take payments directly. The issues we have are this:

-we either host payments ourselves being PCI complient, which will involve hours of coding on our awkward bespoke site,

or

-we use a payment gateway like sage, worldpay, etc, which we can either imbed in our site to look like payment being taken directly or taking the customer to a new site to pay.

It just all seems so confusing and both options are expensive. Any change to our site takes hours of work and the gateway options are much more expensive per transaction. Either way will involve lots of work for our web guys, are we better to bite the bullet and become PCI complient?

We have just finished a block of work on our website and this is the next task which needs to be in place before Jan, which is our busy period. But we have no clue how to move forward on this.

I keep thinking we are missing something as so many companies take card payments. Can anyone offer any advise?

Thanks for reading,

Billy.

 

[fisicx]

Any change to our site takes hours of work and the gateway options are much more expensive per transaction. Either way will involve lots of work for our web guys...

Get rid of your web guys as they appear to be incompetent. Adding a payment gateway to a website is a doddle. I did one the other week for a client and took about an hour (including testing).

 

[billythered]

We have a contract with them and no time to change to another company! They say that we need to decide who we want and then they will build it.

 

[fisicx]

If it takes them hours to make any changes to the site then the contract is flawed and you are being over charged. There is nothing to build, all they need to do is drop the vendors code into the website. It really is simple.

I suspect they outsource the work to some cheap coding factory in Asia which is why the service you get is so poor. If you would like to PM me the site I will tell you how easy it is to add a payment system.

 

[pickaweb]

Accepting payments through your website is an important decision.
There are several providers in the UK that I would recommend eg: SagePay, Stripe, WorldPay.

Check the following list of UK payment gateways

Hope it helps.

 

[Iain_Henderson]

Hi, have a look at Stripe. Our web developers recommended them and have had no problems so far.

Sent from my GT-I9505G using Tapatalk

 

[TODonnell]

Hi all.

We are an established web sales only company and currently we only take paypal payments. While we have our own bespoke (phython based) website most of our customers came originally from ebay so use paypal.

Coding or inserting a payment module on a bespoke website is not the same as installing a plugin on a popular CMS.

Time + labour = money + delay.

Unless there's some special reason you NEED to keep their CC details, use a payment processor. See: TalkTalk.

 

[Maximum Media Solutions]

You certainly don't need to go down the PCI compliant route, we use SagePay, I agree with fisicx, if your company are taking hours and big budgets to undertake a job like this you need to move providers. How much have they quoted you?

 

[RLlewellyn]

If it takes them hours to make any changes to the site then the contract is flawed and you are being over charged. There is nothing to build, all they need to do is drop the vendors code into the website. It really is simple.

I suspect they outsource the work to some cheap coding factory in Asia which is why the service you get is so poor. If you would like to PM me the site I will tell you how easy it is to add a payment system.

Massively agree - sounds to me like your typical "UK Web Developers" outsourcing to India, paying £6 per hour for their services and charging £50p/h here, each to their own I suppose.

SagePay is especially good if you use Sage Accountancy software, the interlinking feature is quite nice. If you're turning over less than 100k per year I'd have a look at Braintree until you decide which one to go with and sort Merchant accounts, they have a 35k free processing for new business accounts deal at the moment which I assume wont last forever.

Either way, good luck!

 

[TotalWebSolutions]

Depending on the platform your website uses it should be fairly straight forward to add a payment gateway to it either by turning on a pre-integrated option or by adding a plugin/extension. Most gateways will offer these plugins for free where possible (unless the ecommerce platform insist on selling it to their clients due to the support elements).

In terms of the charges, they will vary considerably from merchant to merchant. Some gateways such as ourselves will partner with an acquiring bank for the processing and will have preferential rates and terms that you would not ordinarily see if you approached the banks directly. The rates on offer will also vary depending on factors such as card turnover and average transaction value.

Using a secure payment gateway means you are outsourcing the card data collection/encryption/authorisation and storage which as you have pointed out will mean a much lower PCI compliance requirement.

There are a number of comparison websites that will show rates from various providers but ultimately you will need to speak to some in order to get an exact quote.

 

[Alan]

Payment brain is a good comparison site.

Stick with a offsite hosted gateway solution, either with your own merchant account or integrated (like Stripe) the best (most cost effective) option will depend on volume & value of transactions

 

[benb]

For £20 per month you can stick with paypal and who will handle the card payments on your site

 

[antp__]

For £20 per month you can stick with paypal and who will handle the card payments on your site

Going down this route, check this link: http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/threads/paypal-web-payments-pro-got-scammed.351579/

 

[Nochexman]

...But we are now attracting first time purchasers to our website and need to take payments directly...

On the basis that your volumes are low you should look for a pay-as-you-go solution without any fixed fees, like Stripe or Nochex, and you don't need any contractual terms that bind you into a fixed agreement. Sounds like you should see how your volumes are likely to develop and then choose a long terms solution. in the meantime, consider Nochex, who I work for, which has a very simple integration; Stripe has more knobs and whistles, which your developer friends will love as they can charge you so much more for!

 

[sometechcompany]

I agree with fisicx, they are fooling you. I recommend Stripe also, it is basically about copy and pasting they code in your website and there's no upfront cost or monthly fee whatsoever.

 

[Ally Maxwell]

Depending on the platform your website uses it should be fairly straight forward to add a payment gateway to it either by turning on a pre-integrated option or by adding a plugin/extension. Most gateways will offer these plugins for free where possible (unless the ecommerce platform insist on selling it to their clients due to the support elements).

In terms of the charges, they will vary considerably from merchant to merchant. Some gateways such as ourselves will partner with an acquiring bank for the processing and will have preferential rates and terms that you would not ordinarily see if you approached the banks directly. The rates on offer will also vary depending on factors such as card turnover and average transaction value.

Using a secure payment gateway means you are outsourcing the card data collection/encryption/authorisation and storage which as you have pointed out will mean a much lower PCI compliance requirement.

There are a number of comparison websites that will show rates from various providers but ultimately you will need to speak to some in order to get an exact quote.

Does no one on this forum read the original posts before offering solutions that don't fit ?

If you are claiming to be a web development specialist, I would have expected you to at least notice the words 'python' and 'bespoke'.

 

[TotalWebSolutions]

m

Does no one on this forum read the original posts before offering solutions that don't fit ?

If you are claiming to be a web development specialist, I would have expected you to at least notice the words 'python' and 'bespoke'.

I am not claiming to be this at all and nowhere in my post does it state this, so your comment about reading a post would seemingly apply to yourself also Sir.

 

[fisicx]

In any case, just about all the payment providers offer python scripts, API and other integration methods.