Merchant account question
 

SInce almost all 3rd party billers do have their troubles and now with all visa crap, i'm more and more thinking about getting my own merchant account.

My question is, when you stay under the chargeback ratio of 1% and comply with all rules, and you relative safe? Or do you still have the same risks as going with a 3rd party biller?

Andre

From what I was told the 1% still applies. HOWEVER, as opposed to the 3rd party billers that don't let you dispute the chargebacks like a normal merchant account, I believe now you would have that opportunity to dispute and show Visa the person did buy the membership etc etc.

You might want to speak with the folks at Netbilling they gave me some answers earlier this week. Price is a little more to get started with a merchant account, but might be better in the long run.

Andy

I do not sell merchant accounts, we do use our own so I will provide these caveats.

1. You are indeed responsible for your own account and need to stay under 1%. Visa and MC each have different definitions of 1%.

2. You need to do your own scrubbing, refunds, customer support etc.

3. MC startup fee is $1500, annual renewal $1000. Visa startup fee is $500, annual renewal $250.

Unless you have the support and scrubbing mechanisms or the $$$ and time to create them you should consider contracting them out to someone like Netbilling. We have developed our own tools and it has cost us a lot of $$ to write and maintain them.

If you stay below 1%, you dont have a problem.
I have had my merchant account since 1998 or 1999, cant rmember which, through netbilling, I feel safe.
I got a letter my my bank that august 15th my 500$ is due for my annual payment to visa tho, couple months after that the master card payment comes out. But if you want to stay below the 1%, and someone wanted a refund I would give it, other wise it turns into a chargeback, then there goes your 1% ....

what are the benefits of using a 3rd biller these days??

since you are now judged by yourself and not as a group << there is no benefit.

3rd party is dead!

Thnx all, and yes I'm aware of the fraudscrubbing, CS etc...I Was looking for another pary for that...

The setup fees are NP....

Andre

Visa judges you as yourself. Mastercard now looks at the IPSP as the merchant so you are part of their numbers. If you are not exceeding 1% you might be better off with your own account. If you use an IPSP and they exceed 1% combined refunds and chargebacks with MasterCard you are hosed with all of their accounts.

I think the only reason to stay with a 3rd party biller is if you can't get your own merchant account.

Hi,

If you run clean sites, update frequently, don't depend only on mailer traffic, and provide what you promise, you can stay below 1%.

Since you are in the Netherlands, we can most likely help set you up with an offshore merchant account and of course hadle all of the processing, fraud scrubbing and customer service for you.

Please reach our sales department Toll Free within the US: (888)357-8166
or Outside the US: (661)252-2456.

Thank you, Mitch Farber

Andre,

These days there don't seem to be many reasons to continue with 3rd party billers. AdultRep has been helping clients to reduce chargebacks and provide excellent customer service to their members. In addition to full control over pricing and billing policies, a merchant account gives a site the ability to have complete access to customer information.

With many of our clients, we are reversing up to 50% of their chargebacks after they receive them from their merchant bank. The chargebacks we can't reverse are sent to our collection department so the site can at least get their money back.

I'd be glad to discuss this further with you.

Victoria

When the partner is back from holliday we will do for sure

Andre