Merchant accounts

fredjclaus · November 20, 2009

Who here accepts credit cards in your photography business? I had offered a credit card option in the past but found I was spending more in services fees than I was earning. Not too many of my clients in portrait and commercial work wanted to pay with a credit card.

I would like to offer the option however as many people I talk to are no longer carrying cash anymore. Most use their debit/credit card. Does anyone know of a service that could be use where they don't charge you unless you use the service? I've been looking and found many that would help me out being able to process via my wireless phone, but they charge a monthly maintenance fee, a statement fee, as well as the per transaction fees. Are there any that don't charge the monthly fees, only the per transaction fees?

promoguy · November 20, 2009

I don't know of any that don't charge a monthly fee. In my non photography business, I look at it as a cost of doing business. Your monthly fee shouldn't be more then about 15.00 to 20.00 a month. You can lower that depending on how you process the card. I use Quickbooks. If you use the telephone, I do believe it's somewhat less. The big story are the cards themselves which can charge processing from 2.5 to 3.5 per cent. Figure it into you pricing. Or do as I do and just consider it a cost of doing business.

entropysedge · November 20, 2009

If you are a PPA member, check out http://www.midtrans.com/ . great bunch of folks to work with

Art Scott · November 22, 2009

Just starting out I would recommend using PayPal and invoicing for services to be rendered.......no month fees unless you want a terminal....not sure what their terminal fees are.....but with a standard Merchant account.....you gotta pay gateway fees, set up fees, monthly fees that I have seen as high as $100/mo and then a % of income from each card ....from 2.5% to 7 or8%...........again I wuld take a look at PayPal.................

Rocketman766 · November 22, 2009

I use Intuit Quickbooks, when I signed up, they did not charge me set up fee, or monthly fees for 3 months. (some kinda special I think). I do pay a monthly fee now of $20 but if my card fees total $20, then there is NO monthly fee to pay. They even gave me my card swipe, USB that works really well. Yes, this means I have to have my computer with me, but I always do when I have an event to work, so its not a big deal.

The did tell me that if I wanted to do "seasonal" work, I could set up to only use the service during certain months. I would not be charged during the off months, but would not be able to use the system during this time either.

ChatKat · November 23, 2009

Intuit vs other Merchants Services
I am a Certified QuickBooks Advisor. I can get Intuit's services free. One of my clients had a situation that was bad and could easily happen to a photographer. I won't use them because my client had a client dispute a bill that was owed and they did a charge back and refused to even listen to his side of the story. The person disputing was totally wrong but just didn't want to pay the bill. My client even had a written contract. They did not support my client - even with good documentation. My client was out $1000.00!

Make sure that your merchant services will stand behind you in a case like this! I use Google Checkout and the terms are No Refunds since photography is subjective. I will do everything I can to make a client happy with the photography. But when they are unhappy with themselves - I can't fix that!

Merchant accounts

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