The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5)

Merchant account advice

Hello,
I would like to set up a shopping cart for my online store. Can you share positive/negative experience with important players on this market? What pitfalls should I avoid?

Thank you.

Doru Trip
Thursday, March 11, 2004

you can use www.ikobo.com www.2checkut.com or www.paypalcom
I like ikobo because there is not setup fee and monthly fee.
they only charge 1.99% and no hidden fee.
2cchekout is another good one, becaue they have almost the same coutry coverage as ikobo and good user internface. their transaction fee is a little bit higher and also charge setup fee and monthly fee.
paypal is my old lover, they helped me a lot in the past. however, as they grows big, their fees grows too. and add many limits on business merchants can run.

sunshine
Thursday, March 11, 2004

I am also doing a lot of research on merchant accounts. I am interested in using an API to connect to my merchant account, not have my users be redirected from my webpage to a payment processing screen that looks nothing like my own page.

Here is what I have found:

WellsFargo surprisingly is pretty good. They have the option to let you choose whatever gateway you want, but by default they use Verisigns PayFlow Pro.

Charge.com also appears to be a good cheap merchant account source although Im not sure what gateway they use.

I have found that along with the Discount Rate and per transaction fee, you want to pay attention to the Chargeback fee. If you get a low Discount Rate and a high Chargeback fee, one chargeback negates any savings.

I would LOVE to hear anyone elses recommendations.

SteveA
Thursday, March 11, 2004

Does anybody know of a good Canadian Merchant Account service that won't kill me in fees, for small volume?

2_legit
Thursday, March 11, 2004

For Canada, try ParaData.com

Perry Doell
Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Dear friends
I live in Syria. I have e-books to sell online. I have a shopping cart for download and a Web site. I have a Visa card number and a current account a the Beirut (in Lebanon) bank.
The problem is: I couldn't find any merchant account provider because I live in Syria. I do not know what should I do or where to find such a provider.
Please Please Please someone help me.
Regards

Zak
Monday, March 29, 2004

I had account at both 2checkO and Paypol and I have to say that besides high fees that they charge , they froze my account and then when I tried to resolve the matter by contacting the customer support , they did not answer. How is this posible ? I don't know.

Shark
Friday, April 2, 2004