|
Take this into consideration:
The time has come for you to make some decisions; they will be easy for some, harder for others.
It comes down to the amount of risk that you want to take with your business. With the higher scrutiny from VISA, what are you going to do? If you feel comfortable managing that risk on your own, then you need to make the decision to do it. Consider this, with the higher scrutiny that will be soon involved and the risks of getting on the TMF (terminated merchant file), and the consequences of those risks (never being able to process Visa transactions through that domain name, business name or by the operators of that business), would you rather have the backing of companies that have able to successfully manage their merchant accounts for years, or start from scratch?
Am I saying that you should not get your own merchant account and use it? Of course not. In fact, CCBill has had the option to set up your own merchant account and use our value-added services, for years. Most of our customers prefer to have us manage ALL processing facets of their business. They realize that, new rules or not, Visa is going to be more compassionate with a business that is processing through a large processor, following their policies, rather than one that is trying to manage and run adult transactions on their own, through their own merchant account. It is our specialty, and as many people are already aware, it is harder than it seems. And if you are considering going this route and planning on managing an account on your own, will the costs be less for you than a large processor with years of trial/error experience and significant economies of scale behind it?
Advantages to third party processing?
Fraud scrubbing. Having a competent fraud scrubbing system requires a huge infrastructure, it is not a matter of ?no, this guy sounds ok, ill let him in?. You need a database that checks against millions of accounts that had charged back in the past, plus looking at the user on many different levels. Where is he/she coming from? Was the card issued in the same location? What is the language on his browser? Has he signed up for 20 other sites that same day? plus 60 other similar variables.
And when the decision to accept or decline a transaction rests solely in your hands, how might you be swayed? If it is $30 that is either in your pocket or not, are you going to make the decision, that ?Hey, its not worth the risk? or will your emotions sway you to make decisions that might adversely affect your merchant account, and business, 4 months down the road.
Customer Service- The major billing companies have large call centers, dedicated to evaluations on what is your best interest, long term. Should a refund be issued? If we don?t refund this customer, will he hang up and call the bank? Etc
This in addition to having numerous reports at your disposal, password management, a referral program which sends checks out weekly, the backing of a company with some influence who are able to schedule meetings with key decision makers, etc.
CCBill, Ibill and Epoch had to make some difficult decisions recently, mainly ?What are the risks associated with not following the rules that VISA is setting forth and what do we have to lose by not following those rules?? The decision was made that we want to stay in business for the long-term, so we do whatever we can to do so. Are we telling you what you want to hear? No, we are telling you what has to be done, to keep your business running parallel with Visa, long term.
With a third party processor, incentives are aligned. We do what is your best interest, long term. The more that you make, the more we make.
__________________
If you need a good company for check writing services, then check out checkissuing, and for webhosting, check out Phoenix NAP
|