Frank has been writing about payment processing and business services since 2015. He is a retired Air Force officer and a former practicing attorney. He has a Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology from The Pennsylvania State University and a Juris Doctorate degree from the Ventura College of Law, and currently resides in Paso Robles, California.
There are so many processing companies, they all seem to be doing more or less the same thing, and they all have both glowing testimonials and terrible complaints. How are you supposed to choose the best company under these circumstances? Who can you trust? Read on to find out.
While merchant account fees are definitely irritating (and expensive!), they're often an inevitable cost of doing business. Even if you sign up with a payment service provider like Square that doesn't charge monthly fees, you'll still be paying the costs associated with maintaining your account in the form of higher transaction processing rates.
Credit card surcharging has rapidly gained in popularity in recent years as court decisions, and legislative changes have gradually removed legal barriers to the practice. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has greatly accelerated this trend. Nonetheless, the question remains: Should you add a surcharge?
There's a lot to love about Helcim. What we love is that you won't have to worry about the bait-and-switch tactics and long-term, binding contracts that plague the industry. Helcim distinguishes itself from many other providers by offering no binding contracts, exclusive interchange-plus pricing, consistently good customer service, and low account fees.
Choosing a high-risk merchant account provider isn’t the same as working with other payment processors. You can expect different pricing and contract terms — but you shouldn’t compromise on customer service. Here are six great providers that offer great service, fair pricing, and reasonable contracts for small businesses.
Payline Data offers interchange-plus pricing for all its merchants, with discounted rates for nonprofits and medical organizations. On top of that, every plan includes a gateway and virtual terminal, with no long-term contracts. What’s not to love?
Authorize.Net’s payment gateway is one of the most versatile tools for eCommerce. It’s got a solid feature set, including recurring billing and echeck/ACH processing. However, deciding where to get your gateway from is often the biggest challenge. Here’s what you need to know about your options.
At Dharma, you can count on consistently fair and predictable pricing. The company advertises all of its standard rate and fee information publicly on its website. You can also expect high-quality, friendly, personalized service and support from the Dharma team.
With multiple pricing plans tailored to all business sizes, a free gateway, multiple chargeback protection features, and a boatload of other features, there’s a lot to like about CDGcommerce. But you should still make sure it’s a good fit for your business.
Despite some areas of needed improvement, Heartland’s services are surprisingly comprehensive, seamlessly blending tools for a brick-and-mortar location, eCommerce businesses of all kinds, and mobile enterprises. The problem is that its current payment structure seems to lead to some trouble with salespeople not properly disclosing fees, which causes problems further down the line.
Moneris offers an impressive lineup of products and services for Canadian merchants. It provides just about every kind of hardware and software product you would need to run either a retail or online business. However, the company’s lengthy contracts and hefty early termination fees bring it down a notch.
Pivotal Payments rebranded as Nuvei to escape a bad reputation for poor service and hidden fees, but in the process of rebranding, it appears that Nuvei is embracing many of the same tactics that led to its bad reputation in the first place. Some businesses might get a good deal, but most should stay far away.
Flagship’s one notable feature — the lack of a long-term contract or early termination fee — is becoming increasingly common across the entire processing industry. Other Flagship products and services, while generally quite good, are readily available elsewhere. When weighed against the company’s reputation for high rates and fees, and poor customer service, we think you’ll be better served with a different provider. Read more in our full review of Flagship Merchant Services.
Does Electronic Merchant Systems offer everything you need for your small business? Possibly, but it comes at a high cost. Unless you’re prepared to negotiate aggressively on your own behalf, you’ll probably pay more than you need to. Read our review to see why you should look elsewhere.
The payment processing industry is very competitive, with a huge number of providers vying for your business. While only a few are truly excellent, many others are just awful. Paya currently falls somewhere in the middle of these two extremes, sticking close to the industry standard in terms of pricing and contract terms, but not offering any exceptional products or services that distinguish it from other providers.
Our team of experts spends hours on every review so that we can find the best companies to recommend to our readers. Payline Data made the cut.
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The vendors that appear on this list were chosen by subject matter experts on the basis of product quality, wide usage and availability, and positive reputation.
Merchant Maverick’s ratings are editorial in nature, and are not aggregated from user reviews. Each staff reviewer at Merchant Maverick is a subject matter expert with experience researching, testing, and evaluating small business software and services. The rating of this company or service is based on the author’s expert opinion and analysis of the product, and assessed and seconded by another subject matter expert on staff before publication. Merchant Maverick’s ratings are not influenced by affiliate partnerships.
Our unbiased reviews and content are supported in part by affiliate partnerships, and we adhere to strict guidelines to preserve editorial integrity. The editorial content on this page is not provided by any of the companies mentioned and has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities. Opinions expressed here are author’s alone.
Our team of experts spends hours on every review so that we can find the best companies to recommend to our readers. Payline Data made the cut.
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