Which Payment Processor For Ecommerce Site Should I Opt For?

[junipaire2009]

Hi I'm a little confused as to which payment methods to go for as there seems lots of bad reviews for everyone I've looked at. I know every company has bad reviews and people only tend to come on review sites when something goes wrong for them but there may be thousands of satisfied customers.

I basically want to have the most convenience so offer all UK credit cards and UK debit cards. Unsure if its best to go with a merchant account with my bank or maybe go the Paypal Pro route which I've heard you don't need a merchant account.

Any advice would be hugely appreciated.

Cheers

 

[iboxsecurity]

We used to promote payment sense as a good alternative to PayPal Pro because of the fees - however there is a lot of talk of bad customer service which I can't really comment on.

What I suggest is looking into SagePay which is where we tend to point people now a days. Great support, lots of useful information out there and quick setup times across the board.

 

[Jermainecraig]

I've personally never had any problems with PayPal on the business front. Although I used to get a few problems on my personal account, but this was a long time ago.

The payment processor I'm currently using and would recommend is Stripe. This is only if you're using a checkout system that can be integrated with Stripe, or have a developer that can make the necessary integrations. You don't need a Merchant account, and the set up is instant.

 

[junipaire2009]

Cheers guys I'll look into both Stripe and SagePay. As I'm just starting up do you think its maybe best to opt for the free Paypal option and then when I'm getting regular sales move to a subscription monthly paid option.

 

[Jermainecraig]

Yeah personally I've always used the free PayPal option, haven't ever needed a reason to switch. The only time I considered switching was when I learned you need to use the subscription based service to host the payment form on your website (for the sake of branding) but I found customers are actually more comfortable checking out on the PayPal site.

 

[junipaire2009]

Hi Jermaine

So you just offer your customers Paypal Express (where they leave your site to Paypal to buy) and Stripe.

Am I right Stripe is like the same kind of setup to Paypal then where you don't pay a monthly fee but 2.4% transaction and 20p each sale.

Are you using both because of people without a Paypal account, to give them an alternative.

Cheers

 

[Jermainecraig]

Hey,

Yeah that's correct + Yes Stripe is similar to PayPal the fees are a slight bit lower. (I think like 0.5% less or something, haven't checked in a while).

Although customers don't need a PayPal account to pay with Paypal, some of them still get confused so I use Stripe for these customers + they can checkout in the same user-flow without leaving the site.

 

[junipaire2009]

Cool , yeah I know some people will of never used Paypal and don't realize that you don't need to use them so having another option I can see the importance of.

I've heard Amazon also offer Payment. I was thinking about this but do you think having Paypal, Stripe and Paypal would be probably over doing it.

Which Ecommerce platform are you using just of interest. I was going to go with Shopify or Bigcommerce. In the end I opted for Woocommerce as I'd read they had come on so much in the last couple of years. Really glad I did, seems lots of things are possible with it and I know Wordpress quite a bit. It may not be a great choice for a huge store but for me it seems to be working out.

 

[Jermainecraig]

I personally think PayPal and Stripe is enough, but to be honest I've never even looked into the Amazon gateway.

I used to use woo-commerce way back, but then switched to Shopify and love it, very easy to use and the pre-made themes were more to my taste. I actually run a project called "100 Shopifys or Die Trying" where I help people move over from WP to Shopify and i've had some really good feedback .. mostly on the ease of use.

I'm hearing a lot about WooCommerce recently but don't really want to get back into WP stores.

 

[junipaire2009]

Yeah Shopify looks really good I have to say, I won't rule out a move myself in the future if the store becomes successful. At the moment I've put so much design work in my theme and it might be quite costly to have a Shopify equivalent of the same theme as would need help converting to shopify.

Who knows down the line, I do have a couple of projects that I want to explore after this store which may be more suited to quick set ups and shopify might prove to be the best option.

Cheers for putting me onto Stripe, reading about them, they seem really what I'm looking for.

 

[houseofdecals]

I have went for paypal because I know my self when paying with paypal on web sites it feels more secure and safe so wanted my customers to feel the same the FEEs are just a necessary evil

 

[Payment Expert]

The choice is going to be one way or the other; you will need a merchant account even if you go with PayPal they will still go through some form of the deriving process to issue a merchant account for you. The decision will be mostly based on two factors: the technical features that you need and your existing volume if any. The technical needs you can determine yourself by evaluating various facts. If you have no existing volume or it is low (under £50 000/ month) you best choice is probably going to be either PayPal or Stripe. When you volume reaches a certain point you might go to your local bank and see if they have merchant services offering and try to get a better price keeping in mind that you may also have to find a gateway to replace PayPal.

I cannot include a link in my post yet, but if you google ‘Paylosophy’ you will find our blog and there you will find a series of articles explaining how to make a payment gateway selection.

Hope it’ll help.

 

[leemason]

I've been looking at Authorize.net recently as it links with WHMCS (which I want to use) and another system that I want to use. Not sure how competitive their rates are but it gives me the facilities that I need.

 

[LMDServicesUK]

As mentioned by others until you are trading at the £ 400 - 500 PCM month level, PayPal or Stripe are very cost effective, albeit PayPal will always side with the buyer so be aware they can shut you down without warning or explanation.

A conventional merchant account and gateway such as we would provide is a lot cheaper to operate and the funds are paid directly to your nominated Bank account ( no need to transfer from a holding account).

We know we are very cost competitive for our packages and once you are approved, we can have your gateway up and running in 24 hours, we also support FULL(inc 3D Secure) Security as standard unlike some other providers all at no extra cost.

Good luck and I hope your business is successful, and when you reach the magic £ 500 PCM trading, pls do PM me for a quote..

Mark

 

[Karimbo]

£500 PCM? I think it will need to be higher than that.

What is the fixed fee for the retailer when using payment sense? Just £14.95 or is there more? What is the PCI DSS compliance fee? Do you open a vritual terminal and ecomms merchant account and charge minimum fee for each?

Lots and lots of hidden charges. I got stung by the minimum virtual terminal and ecomms fee. I didn't want it as I do not want to take payments over the phone - but was pushed to take it by a salesman who told me it was "free". Well not quite - because it had a minimum £10 usage fee so if we didn't use it that's £10 more to pay each month.

Luckily they waived the minimum fee after I complained.

 

[LMDServicesUK]

£500 PCM? I think it will need to be higher than that.

Lots and lots of hidden charges. I got stung by the minimum virtual terminal and ecomms fee. I didn't want it as I do not want to take payments over the phone - but was pushed to take it by a salesman who told me it was "free". Well not quite - because it had a minimum £10 usage fee so if we didn't use it that's £10 more to pay each month.

Luckily they waived the minimum fee after I complained.

Hi Karimbo

I presume you were not referring to PaymentSense as we do not operate the above mentioned charging structure.

The figure of £ 500 PCM is the level of card transactions a Merchant needs to be doing before a conventional merchant account / Payment Gateway becomes more cost effective than PayPal, Stripe or similar.

To put this in perspective our running costs start at approx £ 35 for the Merchant account and gateway, and this will allow you to process up to £ 4K of revenue per month.

We do not charge for PCI Compliance in Year 1, however we do charge £ 4.99 PCM (which includes the annual scan costs) from year 2 onwards.

If you choose our ecomms account we include the VTG functionality with the solution, and only if your T/O increases beyond a given value do we then insist that you open a second MOTO only account..

Our VTG account is just that, a VTG account, it does not have Ecomms functionality unless you change the account type.

The majority of Merchant accounts all come with minimum monthly service charges that you must hit per month, and if you do not the fee is topped up. so £ 15 charges, you would be topped up by £ 4.99 to £ 19.99. Some providers charges are as high as £ 25 PCM..

As to hidden charges all our fees are clearly laid out within the pricing schedule that is included with the application documents that the Merchant signs, so as I have said on numerous occasions before, a Merchant should always review the whole fees schedule and then query any fees they were not told about or do not understand BEFORE they sign the agreement. Caveat Emptor..

 

[japancool]

As to hidden charges all our fees are clearly laid out within the pricing schedule that is included with the application documents that the Merchant signs, so as I have said on numerous occasions before, a Merchant should always review the whole fees schedule and then query any fees they were not told about or do not understand BEFORE they sign the agreement. Caveat Emptor..

And this really applies to all contracts, not just card processing agreements!

 

[japancool]

For me, choosing a payment processor is very simple. It comes down to cost.

No monthly fee sounds good, but with the likes of Paypal and Stripe, it's offset by higher per-transaction costs. How much it will end up costing you a month depends on your average transaction value and total number of transactions, so it's important to get a handle on this.

Minimum contract lengths and so on can be negotiated, and as I've found out, this industry is incredibly competitive. Look in the right places and you can get a contract with the same card processor for considerably less in terms of both cost and minimum duration. It can pay to go through an agent rather than direct to the card processor, and I've also found that the merchant accounts on offer through the payment gateway providers such as Sagepay (Elevon) and Worldpay (Streamline) are usually not always competitive.

Another consideration is ease of integration with your e-commerce system. It's no good signing up with a gateway provider only to find that your e-commerce solution doesn't support them, and you're going to have to spend hundreds or thousands to get it working!

Equally, if it *is* supported, then why pay more than you have to? Most e-commerce solutions will support Paypal, but why would you pay 3.4%+20p when you can just pay 20p?

 

[Nochexman]

Cheers guys I'll look into both Stripe and SagePay. As I'm just starting up do you think its maybe best to opt for the free Paypal option and then when I'm getting regular sales move to a subscription monthly paid option.

Hi junipaire, just bear in mind that you have to pay Irish VAT on Stripe charges.

 

[Paul Norman]

World Pay. Followed fairly closely by SagePay. Followed at a fair distance by Secure Trading.

 

[GraemeL]

Join the FSB and get a really good deal with Worldpay/Streamline.
I offer Paypal as well only because some people prefer it and it offers an opition for Amex users.

G

 

[Deleted member 136029]

I currently use and like SagePay. PayPal Express too, because the convenience is invaluable for customers, but I don't really trust them.
I've also been looking at Stripe, but am concerned by the lack of 3D secure. Has anyone using Stripe had any problems with fraudulent orders & chargebacks? Do you get any information on orders to indicate whether they're fraudulent, like Third Man in SagePay?

 

[antropy]

One thing to bear in mind is that if you are also selling a lot on eBay, it is the combined total sales that will count towards your bulk discount rates.

 

[amac]

Paypal might not be everyone's first choice but they are increasingly trying to get better with both online and physical POS transactions. Integrating with your bank/erp setup is however a natural choice and would probably be the best route for most.

 

[enry06]

has anyone heard about skrill.com?

 

[japancool]

has anyone heard about skrill.com?

Skrill is what used to be Moneybookers, I think. A Paypal like operation.

 

[wearewattle]

SagePay is a great solution, it has fantastic development and testing support and can be as simple as an iframe to as complex as sever side integration - so it can start simple but scale if your business is to grow.

 

[Barry Seston]

SagePay is a great solution, it has fantastic development and testing support and can be as simple as an iframe to as complex as sever side integration - so it can start simple but scale if your business is to grow.

iFrame can be really unreliable - A Transparent re-direct enables a seamless integration and removes from the Scope of PCI Compliance full audits, it is a better technology.

Sage Pay is a brand name so I'm not sure why they appear to fall behind with technology. In this day and age where a lot of traffic is driven by on-the-go smart devices and PCI Compliance standards are so high, why are the old technologies being used while other companies are innovating to meet demands. Maybe a simple case of Marketing costs less and makes more than R&D but in this case companies like Stripe are making real headway as a result of easy to use improved products.

I'm not sure - I just feel Companies should look at the product, There are different values to each individual Payment provider and it isn't all a standard product / cost/ relationship governed by the company you know.

 

[ecoleman]

Secure Trading. Been using them for years, always recommend them.

 

[Tbozz]

We use WooCommerce and Stripe, which is cheaper compared to both paypal and amazon.
It enables us to accept all major credit and debit cards.

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