Great High Risk Merchant Payment Processor Aid

In spite of which companies and/or banks you might interview as prospective merchant processors for your card payments, make sure you ask the following questions:

Find out the total Setup Costs involved. - Confirm specifically what the grand total upfront costs will be, including any initial costs that you're going to incur through the first few months of processing.

Find out the total Monthly Costs that apply. - Specifically, you will need to ask about any "monthly minimums" that may apply. This could often add $20-25/month in additional cost. Make sure you ask "if I processed $0 in sales, what would my grand total monthly billing amount be?"

Find out if there is any Once-a-year Fee or Annual Cost. - Some processors charge a yearly fee after just the very first 1-2 months of service. Others charge fees up to $95-$150/year and place this in the fine print of the contract.

Find out the Per Transaction Costs in Detail. - You will want to ensure that you understand the "Per Trans/Item" costs and additionally any AVS, batch header or gateway per transaction items.

Ask what "Downgrade Fees" apply. - It is not uncommon for some accounts to have 3 Tiers - Qualified, Mid-Qualified and Non-Qualified. Unfortunately, you will discover often *many* transactions billed out at the Mid-Qualified level which could significantly impact your total cost. A 2 Tier program is thus preferable but make sure to ask what % of transactions are billed at each level statistically.

Ask how Chargebacks & best high risk merchant provider Management issues are handled. - This is a *critical* operational area that effects many merchants and any company should be able to tell you in great detail how it handles these kinds of issues. As an example, do they automatically notify you via e-mail? Or merely mail out rebuttals in United States of America mail that can delay your ability to return a rebuttal?

Do your Due Diligence and see what other merchants have experienced using that processor. - As usual, the top predictor of future results is a processor's current track record with virtually all its merchants!

Very often, the answers to these questions may surprise you. You'll find a large number of businesses that just "go with their bank" for merchant processing and find yourself paying the cost. Just when you shopped for bank accounts you need to too shop for merchant processors.