8 Secrets Your Merchant Processor Really Doesn’t Want You  to Know…

The 3 identities who get paid when a credit card is swiped:

1). Issuing Bank.
2). Credit Card Company. (Card Brands)
3) Merchant Services Provider ( CC Processor / ISO)

There are lots of different fees and charges that make up your rates & fees with these 3 entities. They appear in your monthly processing statement, and an honest processor will make the statement easier to read. Breakdown of types of card run, the interchange rate, and rates charged.

Some processors don’t make it so easy…only showing you your total fees and not your volume or rates. That makes your statement difficult or impossible to read and withhold information for your processing volume. This removes your power as a small business owner to calculate your rates, and assure you are being dealt with fairly.

I am consistently shocked, almost every time I present a quote analysis and reveal how the business-owner is paying anywhere from 6  to 21 times the rates for the premium cards. These are the cards that your customers are getting the reward benefits on, like Air-miles and other stuff. Consider those corporate cards and especially those transactions that happen when someone gives you their card info over the phone…that’s the most expensive.

And by the way….these often represent from of all of your transactions. These rates are added to the base rates of your standard cards.

So, a great rate of 1.39  %   becomes 2.10  %    when a non-qualified rate of 0.071  % is added to it. Check your statements now, to see how much is being added.

So they offered you some fantastic rates in the beginning, but as time moved on, HIDDEN FEES began to creep in and rates began rising ever so slowly, creating a significant dent in your profits. More disturbing is the number of business-owners who never even check their statements or compare against the starting point, and think their costs have risen only because their business has increased.

The worst thing to see on your monthly credit card processing statement is a little line tagged as this *Miscellaneous Fees $30(or sometimes more). Or it may be some other term that is similar. What’s even more disturbing, is they will not tell you what it’s for.  You need to find out!

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is an information security standard for organizations that handle branded credit cards to protect users from the major card fraud schemes. This is a requirement by law and is provided through the credit card processors. What I have discovered on many statements I have personally reviewed, is that there were both monthly charges as high as $49.95 and annual fees of $200 as well. Please note that not all of the providers charge like this, so take a look and see if you are being charged excessively.

Have you been quoted a flat 1% rate for allyour card transactions? I have some bad news for you. There’s no way that’s the rate you’re actually paying. We know this because the processor would go into debt to run these amounts! Charging a 1% flat rate on all transactions does not even cover the interchange rates for the credit card companies (Visa, MasterCard, American Express). It’s equivalent to selling food for less than it costs to make. They are likely quoting you either the interchange rate, without their rate above interchange cost.  And, they aren’t telling you that they will be including the interchange cost in addition to the 1%. They’ll quote “teaser rates”, or lowest possible rate “qualified rates, swiped, debit”, and not what you’ll actually be paying for every card.

Somewhat similar to #6, Bait & Switch ties into the base rates, where they’ll offer you some great-sounding rates, but neglect to inform you of the assessment fees associated with those. I have seen numerous times, that the combination of these 2 rates/fees creates an unreasonable total charge.  This method allowed them to suggest that the business owner was getting a great rate, but in reality, the savings were offset by the other part that was not disclosed. More importantly, they neglect to inform you about the non-qualified rates.   

Here is a STRATEGIC method that can be automatically integrated into your business transactions that can actually turn these transactional expenses into PROFITS. I would love to tell you more about this and better yet, show you how this could have a significant positive effect on your bottom line. Contact me as soon as possible to take advantage of this.