For many businesses, the ability to process credit cards is the difference between being a small, local business, and opening up the potential to be a major, competitive company. Credit card processing also opens your business up to a host of other risks, though, so it’s important that you choose a method that you trust to be safe and reliable.
Every credit card transaction involves four parties: you, the merchant; the credit card owner, or your customer; your bank, or the acquiring bank; and your customer’s bank, or the issuing bank. With so many parties involved, and so many legs of each transaction, there is a lot of room for error if your processing methods aren’t airtight. Another important thing to understand is that both participating banks charge fees for a credit card transaction, meaning the amount you ultimately receive is lower than the amount you charge your customer, which is why many companies choose to add a small fee to credit card transactions under a certain total.
If you currently have On Site software, or another software solution for business, you may be able to integrate payment processing software solutions into your current system without having to add another software to the mix.
OnSite 7 customers can add payment-processing software quickly and easily by setting up an authorize.net merchant account with WorqSmart, eComMerchant or Elavon and acquiring a FileMaker plug-in called “e-authorize.” These two things together allow you to safely and securely accept credit card transactions, expanding your potential client base and allowing your customers to make purchases with greater ease than ever before.
