How to Get Lower Merchant Processing Rates

As a small business owner or franchise operator, credit card payments make up a huge percentage of your transactions. They also cost you a bundle in processing fees. To add insult to injury, some service providers aren’t much help when something goes wrong with the equipment or software. Why not do better for yourself and your business?

A merchant processing company you should look into is Elite Processing Systems. They offer an impressive combination of lower credit card processing rates combined with outstanding 24 hour US based customer service and the PCI compliant systems you need to successfully accept credit cards and more.

The more includes being able to accept personal checks without the risks presented by a traditional 4 day delay in waiting for it to clear the bank so you can breathe easy. Elite Processing Systems works with Telecheck to bring you online and POS authorization electronically.

That more also includes cash advance funding as a quick way to acquire the working capital you need. You’ll be able to get cash advances based on your credit card processing future receivables. You won’t even have to write a check. The funds will be taken back through your credit card sales.

Credit Card Processing by Elite Processing Systems a registered ISO/MSP of Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. Walnut Creek CA.

MegaPath’s Black Friday Strategy

Black Friday will soon be upon us. This is the day after Thanksgiving that marks the traditional start to the Christmas shopping season. It’s a day that retailers brace for and depend on. For as Black Friday goes, so goes the profitability of the year.

The name Black Friday is generally attributed to the accounting practice of using red ink to show losses and black ink to show profits. Many retailers struggle all year long just to pay the bills and keep the lights on. Black Friday represents, at least symbolically, the change of the company’s fortunes from red ink to black ink. That’s how important the holiday shopping season is every year. It can be the difference between profit and loss, survival of the business or bankruptcy.

Since Black Friday and its online equivalent called Cyber Monday (The Monday after Black Friday) kickoff the most stressful and highest sales volume month of the year, it behooves retail businesses to have robust processes in place ahead of time. That includes the ability to process credit card transactions rapidly and securely. Lose your connection to the credit card processing companies, even for an hour, and you risk a stampede of irate customers out your front door and directly to your competitor. It’s even worse online. If your site is down or slow or you can’t accept credit card payments, your competitors are just a click away.

With this in mind, MegaPath is asking retailers, “Are You Prepared For Black Friday?” Even with predictions that consumers will be spending slightly less this year than last, there will still be a torrent of sales activity this shopping season. In fact, it might be argued that with less spending each customer becomes more valuable. Anything you can do to give that customer a pleasant shopping experience will work to your advantage.

MegaPath is a major competitive telecommunications carrier and leader in managed IP services. They serve the retail sector with high speed network connections specifically designed to support secure payment transactions. They call their service a “Payment Processor Extranet.” As the name implies, this is a specialized form of connectivity unlike simple Internet broadband. MegaPath’s Payment Processor Extranet connects to your retail site-to-site MPLS VPN service to securely carry credit card and other payment information from your point of sale locations to credit, debit gift and private label card payment and check payment processors. You choose which processors you work with and can and or change them at any time. MegaPath provides a fully redundant proactively monitored communications network to the processors to ensure that your transactions will get through.

For gas stations, convenience stores and other retailers not connected in a MPLS network, MegaPath offers “StoreConnect,” an IPSec encrypted service that works over a wide variety of broadband connections including DSL, cable, wireless and T1 lines. Like the Payment Processor Extranet, this service gives smaller retailers access to the leading payment processors for fast, secure and reliable transactions.

One of the most important processes involved in payment transactions is PCI or Payment Card Industry security. This standard involves a firewalled secure network protected by encryption and strong access control. MegaPath’s retail solutions are designed from the ground up to be PCI compliant.

So, what’s it going to be this year? Will you depend on slow dial-up access from your POS terminals that will likely keep your customers waiting and irritated as they stand in line? Or will you make the transaction process as transparent to your customers as possible with fast and reliable broadband connectivity? If you choose to make your transactions fast, efficient, reliable and secure, there’s no time to waste. Get more information about MegaPath and other retail connectivity solutions and be ready to make the most from the Black Friday weekend and the entire holiday shopping season.

No Business DSL? Go Wireless

You've just put up a new retail location and you'll be ready to take orders soon. All you need now is to order a DSL line and get it connected to your point of sales system. Oh-oh. You're beyond the range of the nearest telco central office. No DSL. No Cable broadband either. Oh, great. Now what?

One solution that will almost always work is to order a T1 data line. They're fast, highly reliable and available just about anywhere you can get telephone service. But if all you need is an Internet connection so you can process credit card transactions from a few terminals and perhaps upload inventory or accounting data to the home office, the cost and bandwidth of a full T1 line seems a bit much. Isn't there anything lower cost that you can get for nearly any location?

Actually, there is. First of all, don't write off T1 lines as too expensive until you check prices. They've come down a lot in recent years. However, it's true that lower bandwidth applications don't really keep a T1 busy. Have you considered wireless?

Yes, it's true that WISPs or Wireless Internet Service Providers are highly dependent on line of sight transmission. If you can't see the tower, you're probably out of luck. But there's another type of wireless service now available that covers 99% of locations where you're likely to put a business. Think cellular.

What Accel Networks has done is to form partnerships with the major cellular carriers to use their 2.5G, 3G, 3.5G and 4G data networks. As you already know, cell towers are everywhere. But did you know that some of their channels are used to transmit broadband data instead of phone calls? The iPhone is a good example of a cell phone that uses both voice and data channels. Most smartphones do. But if you use a standard flip phone you may not be aware that there is broadband Internet service available in most locations.

Each carrier has its own coverage footprint. Accel uses them all so that they can offer broadband wireless service just about anywhere. This is fixed location service, mind you. Your equipment comes setup for your location and should be up and running in about 15 minutes from when you unpack it.

How about access speeds? It's very similar to DSL business service, with 768Kbps - 1.4Mbps download speed in many areas and 140Kbps download in less populated areas. That's better than ISDN BRI and far superior to dial-up, even with the slower 2.5G data rates. Accel claims 2-4 second response speed for cashless transactions on service that meets or exceeds PCI compliance standards.

Don't fret about lack of DSL service. They may be doing you a favor. For about the same money you can have reliable private data service in as little as 3 days. Does that sound good to you? Find out more about the highly competitive wired and wireless data service available for your business location now.