| For years, merchants and retailers have been | | | | because they key in transactions, process |
| waging a war in the Payment Processing industry | | | | commercial, business, purchasing and government |
| over "interchange fees" -- the hidden costs of | | | | cards, they ended up paying 3.50% or more. |
| processing credit and debit card transactions. | | | | Visa and MasterCard have special programs for |
| Interchange is the amount of each sale that goes | | | | business that process commercial, business, |
| back to the card issuing bank and attributes to | | | | purchasing and government cards, but because |
| about 65% of a merchants actual fees | | | | most processors/sales associates lack the training |
| Although interchange is a significant part of this | | | | and expertise related the acceptance of these |
| equation, I am here to show you that almost half | | | | types of transactions, merchants are set up |
| of your credit card processing fees/downgrades | | | | improperly and have an abundance of |
| can be attributed to working with a sales rep or | | | | unwarranted and unnecessary fees and |
| company that many not be properly trained or | | | | downgrades. |
| have a true understanding of how your business | | | | You may see some of these on your statement: |
| operates. | | | | MID QUALIFIED, NON QUALIFIED, EIRF, |
| It's a scary thought, but there is no regulation in | | | | STANDARD, COMMERCIAL ELECTRONIC AND |
| our industry; anyone can sell payment processing | | | | CORPORATE DATA RATE 1. |
| with no formal training. Sam's Club and Costco are | | | | These fees can easily be eliminated or reduced by |
| now offering payment processing services. I can't | | | | working with a payment processing specialist who |
| tell you the number of merchants whom we have | | | | is familiar with not only interchange but |
| worked with that are using one of these | | | | requirements needed for transactions to process |
| programs. They were quoted one rate, but | | | | as efficiently as possible. |