Payment methods

[elleng.]

Hello,
I am developing my personal site and kind of e-shop. I am making jewellery and bags from recycled materials. So the idea it to sell hand made stuff, especially for young women.
I am thinking what payment methods should I offer. I know that the paypal charges too much. I was thinking paysafecard. Does any one have any experience what the clients prefer?

 

[IzzoNet]

Hello,

I can recommend you on Paypal. Although they charge money, they give the most efficent payment method and everyone know how to use their system - Because it's easy and friendly to use.

Good luck!

 

[Daniel.ChannelGrabber]

I agree with IzzoNet. I hate PayPal, have had so many bad experiences with them and luckily my company has fully moved away from them now but they are the quickest and easiest to set up and most consumers feel safe using them.

No experience with paysafecard, we instead set up a merchant bank account with Elavon (through our Santander account) and then we use SagePay which is pretty good. This gives us very low fees in comparison but was a total headache to set up. Took weeks and even now we need to wait 30 days for our money.

So yea, for immediacy, use PayPal but right away start looking for a merchant account and then maybe use SagePay. There are others out there like Barclays do a complete solution, worldpay and streamline perhaps another to look at.

 

[Cream2cream]

dont bother with paypal, go with a a uk bank

 

[secretphoto]

Paypal is the most recommended payment method for online transactions. I am sure most of your customers are using PayPal with ease and convenience. On the other hand, you can also use direct bank deposit as an optional payment system.

 

[Cream2cream]

type in google paypal ripped me off

type in google hsbc ripped me off

type in google problems contacting paypal

type in google problems contacting hsbc bank


I guess that says it all

 

[CharityClear]

Hi,

You can always look at the payment gateway/merchant account route. It may work out more cost effective in the long term compared to using a bureau service. There is a good, impartial price comparison site here www.paymentbrain.co.uk

Marc.

 

[elleng.]

So no one of you is for a prepaid card like paysafecard? Weird, I always think that this payment methods are going to be the most popular ones because of the anonymity and the fact that you don't risk a lot of money. Apart from that, someone may get a psc as gift and he can use it in the site. Or even better, he just wins a PIN in one of the psc competitions and he just wants to use it....Anyway, I'll checke the sites I got and I will think about it again...

 

[MartCactus]

One of the important considerations will be what your chosen ecommerce software supports.

Nearly all will support PayPal, Worldpay, etc. But if you use a less-mainstream one it will either limit your choice of ecommerce software, or you might have to have expensive custom work done to integrate it with your chosen software.

So you might save a bit by not going with Paypal, and then end up spending a lot more to integrate your software with a less well established one.

As developers of ecommerce software we regularly get calls from new payment providers wanting us to spend the time to create an integration with them, even though we've never heard of them and we've got no customers asking for that integration. Each payment system comes up with their own interface and expects ecommerce software providers to code a special integration for them. I always ask them when they were creating their gateway why they don't give it the ability to mimic a well established one. I recall when 2checkout first came into the market they duplicated the authorize.net gateway - meaning they had instant support from hundreds of ecommerce applications. It seems such a simple thing to do but few do it.

 

[Uwe (Invoiceberry)]

Hi,

It's true that PayPal doesn't have the best customer service and sometimes it is hard to deal with them. However, most consumers know and trust PayPal, so you probably should offer PayPal as one of your payment options.

You could also go with one of the large credit card processors such as Cardsave (http://www.cardsave.net) or WorldPay (http://www.worldpay.com). You can either fully integrate the payment process in your e-commerce system or you can redirect your customer to their page.

Best,
Uwe

 

[DesignsOnline]

You always have to be a bit careful with searching for those complaint type reviews.
It is in our nature not to say anything unless we want to complain, then we make a big fuss. So for a large company like Paypal, for every 1000 users there are bound to be 1 or 2 with a complaint, but you wont hear from the 998 that are happy.

It is always good to checkout reviews, but just bear that point in mind.
This site has a list of details for the prices and comparisons etc: (http://www.ukecommerce.com/Ecommerce-Payment-Solutions.html)

Ive used Paypal personally on loads of different customers websites and not had any problems. Now WorldPay, thats another matter....

 

[Dmkths]

I think its best to give the customer the option of which payment method to use, the more options they have the better, we have 3 ways in which to pay by (card, paypal and google checkout) on our site.

I would also recommend that you get a merchant account and use a PSP for your card payments as the fees will be lower than Paypal.

Regards,

Mark.

 

[tangled]

i only know about paypal............
i cant say about any other money transfer site(s)...
but i can suggest you that you can take payment at home delivery it is the one of the most efficient method............

 

[Matt G]

On a web shop its always recomanded to have more options to pay, so paypal can be one of it. But there are many others like:
1. AlertPay
2. MoneyBookers
3. Solidtrustpay
4. WU

 

[webstore]

. . . I am thinking what payment methods should I offer. . . .

As others have suggest you should offer your clients multiple payment choices of say SagePay, PayPal, Google Checkout, cheque and bank transfer.

PayPal Express is possibility the most convenient for your customers given they don't have to even enter their name & address into your on-line shop as that's posted back from PayPal into your on-line shop but you would need to check if your shopping cart supports PayPal Express.

Carrying on from a philosophy of not putting eggs in one basket also don't just rely on your own on-line shop but maybe use eBay and/or Amazon as well and also don't forget to get your products appearing on Google Product Search if your shopping cart supports that.
.

 

[emmaheuton]

Here are is a concise list of on-line payment service providers:

• Payoneer
• PayPoint.net
• Paysafecard
• PayXpert
• Peppercoin
• WebMoney
• WePay

 

[Holbi]

Hello Ellen,

I will agree with the opinion here, that a few payment methods should be offered to the customers and PayPal should be definitely included as one of the most popular and hence trusted payment solutions. Other alternatives could be Google Checkout, Sage Pay, World Press,Web Money, Skrill - those are all well known payment systems.

P.S. Feel free to check out our payment solutions , and should you find them interesting feel free to PM me.

Kind regards,
Elena.

 

[Jayser100]

Designs on Line is right. Also, in my experience, many of those people who complain have had a bad experience because they messed up in the first place.

I have been using Paypal to take payments for nine years and I have had very few problems really.

paypal is actually highly trusted and popular. If you ignore it just because a few people come on here saying it's rubbish then you are not making a deciision based on good business sense.

On my website, I have Paypal and WorldPay - the split in usage is around 50 / 50. Worldpay isn't cheap but for sure, between the two methods we have all the bases covered (i.e. those who do and those who don't like Paypal have secure buying options).

 

[elleng.]

Thank you very much everybody!
i have to admit I haven't come to a conclusion yet, but I will consider all your thoughts. I guess I will have to give a couple of payment options. And I will try to include psc (since for me as a customer it is my favorite).
One last question, isn't the pay after the delivery option too risky for me?

 

[johnnysheffield]

Unless you're selling in the local area I would get your money up front.

Use PayPal with caution, everything is stacked in the buyers favour even when the buyer is a fraudster. Make sure you enable the avs check within your account and check every transaction that the buyer lives where they say there do. Compare the details with those on 192.com and beware selling to flats in the South East of London (sorry legit peeps!). If it looks suspicious don't send a thing.

Consider a free Google Merchant Account and when funds allow a proper PSP like Sage Pay.

 

[Josh Bawer]

I would say paypal as well as most people know it and trust it. Charges might be more but I reckon security of transactions on the net in this day and age is priceless.

Do not settle for secondary quality in cases like this.

 

[Holbi]

Thank you very much everybody!
i have to admit I haven't come to a conclusion yet, but I will consider all your thoughts. I guess I will have to give a couple of payment options. And I will try to include psc (since for me as a customer it is my favorite).
One last question, isn't the pay after the delivery option too risky for me?

Hi Ellen,

It is a certain risk, of course, but on the other hand, many customers prefer to puchase goods online this way and will trust you more as an online store if you have such an option. I know that from my own experience, when buying stuff online. In fact, that's the almost the only way I buy online!

Kind regards,
Elena.

 

[j600com]

dont bother with paypal, go with a a uk bank

Terrible advice, if anything go with SagePay or Skrill - but be wary of the mainstream UK banks solutions they often work out more expensive (and can be expensive to integrate into some platforms). The likes of PayPal and Sagepay will usually be common/supported on most platforms.

If I had to pick in order I'd be looking at.a primary gateway like SagePay/Skrill then PayPal as a secondary option - the banks would be bottom of that list.

 

[j600com]

Ps But to start out PayPal would be best as zero monthly fees.