Author Page for Melissa Johnson

Launching a new business during a global pandemic isn’t ideal, but that’s exactly what Teri Castrop, Kansas City’s own self-professed “Caramel Lady” has done. As the founder of Kansas City Caramels, she’s had to navigate all the challenges that come with starting a small business — while juggling the shortages, supply chain disruptions, and general chaos that COVID-19 has created.

Accepting payment via American Express has long been a challenge for merchants; it used to require working with Amex directly, and the card fees were greater than what you’d pay for Visa or Mastercard. However, thanks to the OptBlue program, since 2014 American Express has offered a viable way for small businesses to accept Amex […]

If you have never encountered a credit or debit card with a chip embedded in it, you’ve probably been living under a rock for the past 3-4 years. In which case, you’ve got an awful lot to catch up on and we’ll come back to chip cards after you’ve covered the important stuff. However, if […]

The Swift B250 card reader, available with the SwipeSimple mobile app, is an all-in-one reader (meaning it accepts swipe, chip, and contactless/NFC transactions) available for a very reasonable price. The mobile app is solid, providing all of the features you need to take payments on the go, plus a little bit of extra value.

ShopKeep and Square offer features for cafes and specialty shops, plus free software plans and affordable in-house payment processing for small businesses. See how they stack up and which is right for you!

I’ll be honest. Excluding trips to the grocery store, I’m always a bit surprised when I see a business with a clunky old POS. I just about cringe when I see one of the really old systems. And maybe that’s because my job is reviewing mobile processing apps, but in 2018 there’s really no reason you […]

Pros Supports all-in-one payments Bluetooth connection Solid design Charging dock available Cons Expensive compared to other options Overview in February 2018, PayPal introduced two new (and affordable) readers to its lineup of PayPal Here-compatible hardware: its entry-level Chip and Swipe Reader and the full-featured Chip and Tap Reader. Both are EMV-enabled so that you can […]

We are commonly asked whether Square is the cheapest credit card processor for a given business. Sometimes the answer is clear, other times it’s more complicated. If you have a higher-volume business (say, $10K per month or more in card payments), then you can almost certainly find a better pricing plan than Square offers. But what […]

Credit card fraud, for most people, conjures up one of two scenarios. First, there are data breaches à la Target or Home Depot, where thieves access the system and steal credit card numbers, names, and other data. Beyond that, you might think of online card fraud, where shady people use stolen card numbers (sometimes acquired […]

So you’ve signed up with a credit card processor that offers an mPOS app. Great! Time to download the app and get started. So you head over to the app store of your choosing and search by name. You find the app and are getting ready to download it to your phone or tablet. But […]