Need Some Guidance Folks

[Mojo]

I did a little experiment and it worked and am now offering my awnings and solar screens to anyone in the USA. I found that I can make and ship awnings at a fairly cheap price and now customers are coming to me from all over the country wanting them done and shipped to them. I have orders heading west and north next week and have one this morning that is heading up to the far North.

Most of my business comes from word of mouth, from RV forums where my name is passed around and from me doing awnings seminars at RV conventions / rallys.

Great news for me and I am flat out busier then hell right now but................I have one problem. Most want to pay by credit card or Paypal. I did a transaction yesterday for $ 650 through Paypal and the bastards skimmed $ 20 bucks off the top of the transaction.

I know most of you do local work but does anyone have any suggestions ? I have considered online credit card merchant services, Sam's CC merchant services, etc. I just do not have a clue as to which way to go.

While Paypal takes a chunk of the transaction they do not charge me a monthly fee. The CC merchant services do charge a monthly fee plus a transaction fee. I am trying to find the cheapest way around this because I know I am going to either have to absorb the costs which will hit my margins or pass the costs on to my customers, something I hate to do as I have busted my butt to get my prices down where they are competitive with the big awning manufacturers.

Any ideas ? Are any of you offering credit card payments to your customers ? If so who are you using or how are you doing it ?

Chris

[Gregg @ Keystone Sewing]

Any ideas ? Are any of you offering credit card payments to your customers ? If so who are you using or how are you doing it ?
Chris

Cost of doing business, and if you are not offering CC or PayPal for online transactions, well, I don't know how you could keep your virtual doors open.

[Mike8560]

I used to ha ea merchant acount they took 2% off but then there was monthly fees and the rental of the equipment to I'm sure it was close to your. $20 skim.
For online orders ehat se can you do? Would you offer this to your local customers also ?
It's good for themm but as younlniw you loose money unless they wouldn't do the work otherwise. 

Do you think your busy cause there snowbirds getting ready to come south   

[scarab29]

I found my bank has the best deal for me. The rates are a little higher for non swiped transactions though better than pay pal. I had trouble with pay pal in the past in regards to chargebacks and will never use them again. Their customer service is horrible and I can't say enough bad things about them.  :o

[mike802]

Chris:  When I first looked into taking CC I went through the NFIB, National Federation Of Independent Businesses.  I thought since I was a member I would get a good deal, not the case.  My local bank gave me the best deal.  It runs about 2% on each transaction with a monthly fee of approximately $45.00 but that depends on the number of days in the month.  You could offer a cash discount so the extra cost are not passed on to everyone.

[Mike8560]

My deal
was about the same  as mike 892. 
As I recall they did t sant the extra cost pasted o. As In It is This much for  charge.   

[Kathy0701]

I started looking at Square. My nephew uses it. I've been seeing the squares in shop windows. There is a website. Their per use charge is slightly higher, but no monthly fee and I believe you can accept cc with an iPod or cell phone.

[Saddleman]

Sure Paypal can be an 800lb gorilla, and they get their fair share of your work.  What merchant account bank will do better?  Because these are not card present transactions the discount rate will be high regardless.  The the merchant account bank can hit you will monthly statement fees, annual fees, and will nickel and dime you until they are getting close to the same 3.5% Paypay takes but with no other fees.

I give Paypal  a lot of money every month.  But they do help me with order/invoice tracking, shipping becomes more automated, and they take care of fraud protection up front.  As long as you play by their rule book (which is smart IMHO) you have some pretty decent seller protection.  I use them to lighten my admin load and it is just a cost of doing business whether it is them of a merchant account bank. 

Raise your price!!!!  Screw the big awning places...you have a better buying experience for your customers.

Loren

[Gregg @ Keystone Sewing]

Loren is on point about paypal and security.  Anytime someone shows up show appears sketchy, we tell them to make payment through paypal, not cc.  They quicky disapear.

[hurricane]

Paypal protects both the seller and the buyer. Generally credit card companies will always side with the buyer, so if you have any disputes, you stand a better chance of winning with paypal. Plus people like to use paypal because they don't have to give their credit card to you. Have you checked out Google checkout? I don't know how that works.
Everyone is going to charge you something. Paypal charges 3%. Banks will charge you a percentage, but once you have a history with them, you can negotiate the rate down. The higher the per item sale, the lower the rate you can get. So since your items are fairly expensive, you might be able to get it down below 2%, but you will lose online customers if you don't offer Paypal. I would suggest offering as many payment options as possible. If you accept checks, you probably won't have to pay any fee.
Very soon, the big banks are going to offer an alternative to Paypal. There is one now called Zashpay that only charges 25 cents per transaction, but you would have to convince your customers to use it.

[scottymc]

Chris, what about bank transfer on the internet, shows up in your bank account within 3 days then you send the product off, If they want it faster tell them to pay through paypal but they have to pay $20 extra fee.
Bank transfer is free for everyone, we insist on it with our accommodation business and also my surfboard covers, over here people are shying away from credit cards.

[Allan]

Chris

Just add 3.5% onto your price and you will probably still come in cheaper than the competitors

It all depends how many of these transactions you are doing a month as to bank V paypal

I prefer paypal as i don't have to keep giving out the CC number

Allan

PS.   When are we going to get some photos of these awnings for those of us down south who are interested

[Mojo]

The boss made an executive decision and decided that we would stick with Paypal. ( For those of you wondering yes I do have someone to answer to and that is higher up in the chain of command then me and that person is my wife. :)

She had some valid points that she made and one of them was the liability of having someones credit card info. As she said " I want nothing to do with someone else's credit card. Let Paypal worry about that ". She felt that if their credit card ever got hacked, they wouldn't accuse us of the problem.

It was also her feeling that despite the high 2.9 % charge we at least do not incur any monthly fee's for having the account or charges for equipment. So overall it works out to be about the same. She said that if the customer didn't have a Paypal account they would have to write a check and wait for the check to clear before materials were ordered and the work commenced.

So I am going to go ahead with what I am doing and continue to use Paypal. I do appreciate everyone's input. I appreciate being able to bounce these things off all of you. Thanks gang.

Chris

[Mojo]

I did also want to comment on Hurricanes post. he is very right. When sh*t hits the fan in a credit card dispute, chances are the CC company will back the consumer.

My son owns a large international tech company and deals with this crap all the time. He loses tens of thousands of dollars every year by customers who charge a software license from his company and then cancels the transaction after they get the software and licensing information.

We were talking one night and we had a long discussion about his business. I cannot believe the crap these techies pull on his company. I see now why his stress level is so bloody high. It is the daily BS he has to deal with from these scammer's who pull unethical crap on his company. I guess we should be thankful for the industry we are all in. Though Bob just got nailed the other day on a machine. That was a completely fraudulent deal and I do believe his customer is in some very serious trouble.

The disputes I have heard about with Paypal most times went in favor of the seller. Very good point
Hurricane and thanks for posting.

Chris

[Saddleman]

Chris,  Customers do not have to have a Paypal account.  You can send them a Paypal invoice and they can pay with their credit card and never need to log into paypal. 

Loren