Paymentsense lease for card payment terminal

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

Hello,

I was looking for some advice regarding an issue I am currently experiencing with Paymentsense.

I am a small online retailer, and we have a card terminal machine which is generally used for outside events we are involved with. Unfortunately we have not used the machine often over the last 6 months, and we received a letter from Paymentsense advising that our account would be terminated if we did not confirm that it would still be required (due to the lack of transactions being processed). We decided to continue with our service, and we liaised with our Account Manager to progress this (this involved signing some electronic documents), however the account itself had been suspended so we were advised that we had to reactivate this. The Account Manager subsequently walked through the relevant steps to re-activate the terminal, however this was unsuccessful. He then advised that we would require a replacement terminal due to a fault with our original terminal - the new terminal was delivered shortly afterwards. We then completed setup of the new terminal which was absolutely fine.

Several weeks later we received a letter from First Data Merchant Solutions advising that a new direct debit agreement had been set up for lease of the new machine, which would be for 5 years, commencing on 1st June 2014. We are already several years into an existing 5 year contract that commenced around April 2012, and we definitely did not knowingly agree to sign up to a new 5 year lease, and we were definitely not advised of this by our Account Manager. We simply assumed that if we were required to replace our machine due to a fault, then this would fall under the existing terms of our lease agreement.

I have since contacted First Data who have advised that Paymentsense will need to resolve this as they processed the lease agreement. Unfortunately Paymentsense are not taking any decisive action, and have not been phoning me to provide any updates on progress or offering any potential resolution. I have called Paymentsense numerous times this week and they keep telling me that someone will be looking at this, but are not then calling back. I am becoming extremely frustrated with this level of service as I am very concerned they are not going to honour my existing lease agreement, and will simply keep taking money from me for a further 5 years.

I would be very interested to hear if anyone else has experienced a similar scenario and, if so, how they reached any kind of resolution.

 

[CompuGlobal-Hyper-MegaNet]

Funny that your problem is with them not calling back.
Mine was with them calling too many times (and spamming me onto their email mailing list which spews out garbage at an alarming rate). Had to tell them to naff off in the end. I don't trust or like companies that have pressurised sales tactics (especially ones that also have a reputation for misleading customers during the sign-up process).

From what I understand, it sounds right that a new lease is created for the new machine. However they should have explained this to you and would have required you to agree. You clearly have the right to cancel, but that leaves you stuck with the old, non-working machine.
The original terminal may be fixable - they might just have not tried hard enough because they want to rope you in for another few years and collect a commission.

Once you get this horrible saga sorted, have a look into solutions like payleven, world pay zinc etc. for the occasional outside activity it may save you some money.

 

[mhall]

There should not be a new lease- you had a defective terminal during your current lease and this lease stands- but I will bet my mortgage that you have "signed" for a new lease - its how these people operate.

Stand by for Mark coming to their defence ...

 

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

Funny that your problem is with them not calling back.
Mine was with them calling too many times (and spamming me onto their email mailing list which spews out garbage at an alarming rate). Had to tell them to naff off in the end. I don't trust or like companies that have pressurised sales tactics (especially ones that also have a reputation for misleading customers during the sign-up process).

From what I understand, it sounds right that a new lease is created for the new machine. However they should have explained this to you and would have required you to agree. You clearly have the right to cancel, but that leaves you stuck with the old, non-working machine.
The original terminal may be fixable - they might just have not tried hard enough because they want to rope you in for another few years and collect a commission.

Once you get this horrible saga sorted, have a look into solutions like payleven, world pay zinc etc. for the occasional outside activity it may save you some money.

Many thanks for your comments. I suspect you might be right about being misled into signing a new lease for the replacement terminal, although I don't actually remember doing this, and this was definitely not explained to me by my Account Manager. I'll definitely consider other options in future as I'm really not impressed with their customer service and sales tactics.

 

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

There should not be a new lease- you had a defective terminal during your current lease and this lease stands- but I will bet my mortgage that you have "signed" for a new lease - its how these people operate.

Stand by for Mark coming to their defence ...

Cheers for your comments .... I'm definitely going to keep pushing on this one as I was actually quite happy with the service until I had to deal with a new Account Manager who is clearly not interested in maintaining a positive working relationship with their customer. Will be interested to hear Mark's views on this!

 

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

Further update ... I have been advised that apparently I did sign for a new 5 year lease, when I thought I was simply trying to get my old terminal working again. This was definitely not explained to me by the account manager, and I think I'm going to have to go to have to approach the Financial Ombudsman for advice. Paymentsense are digging their heals in on this, despite the fact it makes no real sense that I would want to move onto a new 5 year lease when I was simply trying to get my old terminal working again. Very dodgy sales tactics indeed!

 

[mhall]

Buyer beware- you will get nowhere as you signed the document. As much as I agree that their sales tactics are shady you did sign for them. As it's a business contract you don't have a leg to stand on as there is an assumption that you will always read the commercial contracts you sign. I would go through the document you signed with a fine toothed comb to see if anything has been added after you signed it as that will come back and bite you on the bum as well as they will deny anything was added.

 

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

All fair points - my main contention is that I believe I was asked to sign a document to 'reactivate' my account, rather than taking a new 5 year lease for a terminal - although admittedly I didn't take the time to go through all the T&Cs. At the point when I was asked to sign the document, my terminal had not been diagnosed as having a fault so the suggestion that I needed a replacement terminal had not even been raised at this stage by the account manager - he in fact went and organised one without consulting me after we had tried to reactivate the old terminal, AFTER I had signed the electronic documents. I have now requested a copy of the lease agreement, and I will also try to confirm more precise timings of events. Might be a waste of time but I feel I still need to try and pursue this as I'm pretty disgusted with their conduct throughout!

 

[lesliedocherty]

This must be the only post regarding machines/merchant account where a sales person from payments sense hasn't jumped in, funny !

 

[BenKirkwood]

This must be the only post regarding machines/merchant account where a sales person from payments sense hasn't jumped in, funny !

Paymentsense jumping in... Already been escalated to senior management and is being investigated; We have a full audit trail of communications including the call recordings so I have no doubt this will be resolved shortly. I have contacted the OP by PM.

Ben.

 

[LMDServicesUK]

Tx mhall for your observations, and I am not defending actons that I do not have all the fact to hand, also I did try and post earlier Leslie but it did not go up for unknown reasons..

Since then one of our Senior Managers has contacted ther member to offer assistance/resolve the situation.

Furthermore if the Member did sign a new e-sig agreement they are automatically email the signer a full set of the documents they have signed as a record of the agreement.

So not ignoring this one honest !

 

[mconridge]

I was a 'defender' of PaymentSense. We have four terminals with them and been very happy with the service.

We took a fifth one out for our new store and boom! It appears when things go well PaymentSense are a fine company, but when there is an issue they are terrible. Numerous delivery mistakes, hours spend waiting on hold, cut off time and time again, non call backs, no replies to emails. A complete and utter shambles. There doesn't appear to be any 'Management' available at any time.

We won't be using them for any further terminals and I wouldn't recommend anybody else does either. Shame really.

 

[mhall]

It is a shame, we had eight terminals with them at one point but one Christmas two went down in a week (second week of December) and it took them three days to replace them, and one of the replacements was faulty. The stress for all concerned was incredible. Their "Head Office" couldn't have cared less and we left them as soon as we possibly could after that. You are right in that, while they are collecting the payments and everything is working they are fine, but a company is judged by what they do when there is an issue, and payment sense were sadly lacking. There is nothing more expensive than a cheaper solution.

 

[Insularis Solutions Ltd]

Still no word from Paymentsense. Was advised I would receive a callback on Wednesday but no contact has been made - I am becoming increasingly frustrated at the overall lack of customer service as this has been dragging on for several weeks. Also, I definitely didn't receive a copy of the lease I apparently signed electronically. I requested this again on Wednesday so am still awaiting this too.

 

[BenKirkwood]

Still no word from Paymentsense. Was advised I would receive a callback on Wednesday but no contact has been made - I am becoming increasingly frustrated at the overall lack of customer service as this has been dragging on for several weeks. Also, I definitely didn't receive a copy of the lease I apparently signed electronically. I requested this again on Wednesday so am still awaiting this too.

Please accept my apologies for the delay; Internally this has been escalated and I know it is being investigated. I'll follow up by PM with more info.

 

[daisy13]

I feel for you ... PaymentSense are a complete and utter nightmare to deal with (in my experience).

However, as with most contracts there should be a 7/14 day "cooling off" period within which you should be able to cancel your contract. Worth looking into.

 

[Ian Spielman]

I feel for you ... PaymentSense are a complete and utter nightmare to deal with (in my experience).

However, as with most contracts there should be a 7/14 day "cooling off" period within which you should be able to cancel your contract. Worth looking into.

Daisy, as someone also in the industry, I wont comment on my direct competitors, butone thing Ican say is that unfortunately, the 7/14 day cooling off period doesn't exist in our sector.

To circumvent that, I personally ALWAYS tryto discuss the options and explain in great detail how everything works and will try to ensure that the Merchant understands how things work before signing them up. This method has proven itself to me time and again.

 

[LMDServicesUK]

With regards to physical terminals and associated Merchant accounts, for Sole Traders / Partnerships there is a 7 day cooling off period, for a Limited company there is no cooling off period, this is normal practice across the whole industry as mentioned by others.

This does not apply to E-comm or MOTO facilities which are offered on a 90 day rolling contract basis in PaymentSense's case.

This should have been clearly explained to at the point you were discussing the proposition as offered to you.

 

[Talay]

Seems you can bundle this lot in the bin in the corner marked "crap" along with estate agents, recruitment agents, business transfer agents, travel agents.......Hmmmmm, perhaps it is the word "agent" which should set the alarm bells ringing ?

Sod that, I'm only dealing with principals in future, no more agents.

 

[GPHO]

Mark of LMD services is right. There is no cooling off period for a limited company and PaymentSense applied the letter of the law to my company. Their sales people kept the five year period of the lease of the terminal very quiet when they signed me up. They hastened my signing by calling me and putting pressure on me while I was very busy with other matters and, to my great regret, I too failed to read the contracts properly. I accept culpability for that ommission.

Within two hours of signing I was on the phone to explain that I had told the sales people time and time again (about five times in all, as I recall) that I did not want my agreement to start until I could cancel the one I was already committed to with another provider but, despite that, resulting from pressure from them, I was locked in to agreements with two providers for the next ten months; a very costly position for a tiny company.

They refused to budge. A pity because, if they had suspended the agreement for ten months as I had asked I would be using them now. As it is, I had to terminate the agreement prematurely for which they made a total charge of £1,800. The company could not afford such a debt and had to fold. If they had been prepared to do voluntarily for the company what they were legally obliged to do for a sole trader or a partnership, a lot of unpleasantness could have been avoided.

 

[kelvin1950]

I'm sure someone involved with them will be along soon to justify their actions. I wouldn't touch them with a barge pole after all I've read on here over the last couple of years.

 

[14Steve14]

There seems to be a lot of serious complaints on these forums about paymentsense, which cannot be good for any business. If paymentsense have the phone recordings, ask for copies before they loose them, or say there is nothing in the conversations about repairing a faulty terminal. Keep copies of all emails just in case.

I was thinking of using these people once, and after reading only a few of the posts on here, I decided to go else where. They didnt even get on the short list, which now I can see was a good plan. Sorry paymentsense but you deserve all you get for the bad way things are done.

 

[japancool]

I'm in a similar position to the OP as regards occasional terminal use. As the likes of Pyapal Here, iZettle and Payleven don't charge monthly fees, and there's just a one-off payment of around £60 for the terminal, it makes sense if you're only going to use it once in a while for events. I'm going with iZettle, I think.

 

[LMDServicesUK]

Hi Japancool

Have iZettle now resolve their issues with processing Visa card payments ?

Also WPZ card reader now retails at £ 79.99 although still IMHO a better solution than PayPal or Payleven even though I cannot sell it !!).

 

[japancool]

Hi Japancool

Have iZettle now resolve their issues with processing Visa card payments ?

Also WPZ card reader now retails at £ 79.99 although still IMHO a better solution than PayPal or Payleven even though I cannot sell it !!).

I'm pretty sure they have now, yes. I'm sure I read that they had a while ago.

I did look at WPZ but I don't see a lot of advantage to any of them really, as they all have more or less the same fees (2.75%), but iZettle will reduce the fee depending on how much you do in that particular month, which is the big bonus.

Here we go, iZettle and Visa:
http://www.arcticstartup.com/2013/02/20/izettle-solves-the-visa-problem

 

[CardswitcherUK]

Adyen Shuttle worth thinking about. There is a £10 MMSC and unit is more expensive but transaction rates are lower (even than iZettle!).

 

[Thermodynamic Man]

We are looking for a merchant service but what I have read on this post and a few others I can guarantee PaymentSense will not be in the frame at all