May 25th, 2016 by Elma Jane
Gaining new customers? Gift cards are a great way for your business!
The gift card is your first opportunity to make an impression. Displaying your gift cards at your checkout counter in front of your point of sale terminal is a good idea, even if the customer doesn’t buy a gift card that day, they know that they have the option in the future.
Offering a special discount for purchasing a gift card such as 10% off the next purchase or a $5 certificate. This will bring your customer back.
Having a stock of customized gift cards is a great way to show that your cards are for every occasion. (Birthday, Anniversary, Get Well Soon and Congratulations cards)
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Gift & Loyalty Card Processing Tagged with: customer, gift Card, point of sale, terminal
May 5th, 2016 by Elma Jane
- A terminal lease carries with it a 48-month lease agreement.
- The cost of that lease can run anywhere from $50-$100/month.
That is a LONG time to be paying for a terminal equipment that doesn’t cost more than $400 these days.
- If a merchant pays upfront the cost of the purchase is completely tax deductible, you don’t need to pay $2400 for a terminal equipment that costs $400.
If you can’t pay cash for your credit card terminal, you can just charge it to a business credit card. The interest paid is still tax deductible. That’s a savings of nearly $2,000 that can be better directed toward developing and expanding your business.
Need to set up account give us a call at 888-996-2273.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Travel Agency Agents Tagged with: credit card, merchant, terminal
May 4th, 2016 by Elma Jane
Credit Card Terminal for…..
Some processors offer a free terminal to their merchants, but as we all know, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch! A free terminal carries with it a yearly Terminal Replacement or Warranty charge of $50 to $100/year. That’s still much less than what a lease would cost you, but it’s not really FREE
If you’re not currently in a lease but are considering one, don’t be deceived. Instead, calculate the total cost of leasing vs. owning. The best and most affordable option still lies in ownership.
If you need to set up an account give us a call at 888-996-2273
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Travel Agency Agents Tagged with: credit card, merchants, processors, terminal
May 3rd, 2016 by Elma Jane
MerchantConnet is a great tool for merchants, it contains all the information that a merchant needs to manage their electronic payment activity. It’s fast, easy and secure!
- Merchant can view or update account information and make changes.
- Find copies of statements.
- Find valuable products and services to help merchant with their business.
View recent deposits and other information about account activity including:
- Batch Details
- Chargeback
- Retrieval Status
- Deposit History.
The merchant can also find news and information to help manage payments at your business. Learn how to:
- Best Qualify Transactions
- Reduce Risk
- Manage Chargebacks
- Find reference guides to help operate your payment terminal.
The merchant can also utilize the BIN Lookup when you need to inquire about which bank issued a particular card. Simply enter the first six digits on the card and you will receive the information on the issuing bank, including contact information.
If you need a to set-up an account and want to use this tool give us a call at 888-996-2273
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants Tagged with: bank, card, chargeback, merchants, payment, terminal, transactions
April 27th, 2016 by Elma Jane
Near field communication is a contactless communication protocol between devices like (smartphones, tablets, smartwatches or even credit cards themselves) with a nearby NFC-enabled terminal by simply authorizing your device with a passcode or fingerprint authentication.
Both merchants and customers benefit from near field communication technology, by integrating credit cards, train tickets, and coupons all into one device. Faster payment transaction times and fewer physical cards to carry around.
If your smartphone has an integrated NFC chip, you can use a mobile wallet app like Apple Pay, Android Pay and Samsung Pay for items at retailers that support NFC transactions. Just load up your credit cards on your mobile device and wave or tap your device near an NFC compatible terminal to pay, no card swiping required.
As the technology keeps growing, more NFC compatible smartphones will be available and more businesses will offer NFC card readers for customer’s convenience.
Apple Pay, integrated into the newest generation of Apple mobile devices and incorporates NFC technology. If it becomes widely used by many iPhone users, perhaps merchants will be encouraged to more quickly adopt NFC technology.
Many major banks and credit cards are supporting NFC technology, issuing new cards with embedded NFC chips. This means that you may be able to tap or wave your card at the terminal instead of swiping, no phone required, in the next few years.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Near Field Communication Tagged with: cards, contactless, credit cards, customers, merchants, mobile wallet, Near Field Communication, nfc, payment, Smartphones, tablets, terminal, transaction
April 14th, 2016 by Elma Jane
Accepting credit card payments is a must if you’re planning to start a business. It’s good to know what is out there and how it applies to your situation. So you need to learn about credit card processing machines, depending on your business.
Here are some of the different types of credit card processing machines:
Dial-Up Terminal – the grandfather of credit card processing machines. Dial-up terminals use a phone line to connect with a credit card processing company. The advantage is that they are normally inexpensive than some higher-end options. The disadvantage is slower processor speed.
IP Terminal – connect the merchant over a high-speed internet connection. The advantage of IP terminal over dial-up terminal is speed. IP machines can process transactions as fast as 3 seconds as opposed the 10 to 25 seconds that a dedicated dial-up machine might take. IP terminals now cost about the same as dial-up units and that a single DSL link can accommodate more than one credit card terminal.
Wireless Terminals – the priciest yet most convenient type is a wireless machine that runs on a wireless network, much like your mobile phone.
Virtual Terminal – virtual terminals are computers running credit card processing software connected to a credit card reader. Virtual terminals are a great addition to an office because they don’t require a standalone credit card processing terminal.
There are many options available for your business, whether you’re e-Commerce, MOTO, In-Store or Mobile there’s a credit card processing machine and platform out there that will fit your business.
Give us a call to know more at 888-996-2273 or visit us at www.nationaltransaction.com
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit Card Reader Terminal, e-commerce & m-commerce Tagged with: card reader, credit card, credit card processing, e-commerce, merchant, mobile, moto, payments, terminal, virtual terminal
February 24th, 2016 by Elma Jane
Merchants can bring in new customers and encourage repeat business by using their point-of-sale terminal as a marketing tool. A point-of-sale terminal allows you to process payment and accept debit and credit cards, and generate more business by using the right tools.
Customize Receipts – a customized receipt becomes an advertisement. The customer knows where that receipt is from should they want to contact you.
Gift Cards Program – Gift card recipient are likely to spend over the face value of the card. Customers will appreciate simplified gift shopping.
Loyalty Program – Loyalty program makes customers think of your business first and encourages them to come back often to earn a reward.
Referral Rewards – Print an offer to reward referrals, so they can send people to you.
A merchant account is not just an expense by finding the right tool you can generate more income for your business!
visit www.nationaltransaction.com today, or call 888-996-2273 Extension 1
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Credit Card Reader Terminal, Point of Sale Tagged with: credit cards, customers, debit, gift Card, loyalty program, merchant account, merchants, payment, point of sale, terminal
February 2nd, 2016 by Elma Jane
Businesses continue to struggle with the prohibited storage of unencrypted customer payment data. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), merchants are instructed that, Protection methods are critical components of cardholder data protection in PCI DSS Requirement.
PCI DSS applies to every company that stores, processes or transmits cardholder information. Regardless of the size or type of business you operate, the number of credit card transactions you process annually or the method you use to do so, you must be PCI compliant.
Data breach is not a limited, one-time occurrence. This is why PCI compliance is required across all systems used by merchants.
Encryption and Tokenization is a strong combination to protect cardholder at all points in the transaction lifecycle; in use, in transit and at rest.
National Transaction’s security solutions provide layers of protection, when used in combination with EMV and PCI-DSS compliance.
Encryption is ideally suited for any businesses that processes card transactions in a face to face or card present environment. From the moment a payment card is swiped or inserted at a terminal featuring a hardware-based, tamper resistant security module, encryption protects the card data from fraudsters as it travels across various systems and networks until it is decrypted at secure data center.
Tokenization can be used in card not present environments (travel merchants) such as e-commerce or mail order/telephone order (MOTO), or in conjunction with encryption in card present environments. Tokens can reside on your POS/PMS or within your e-commerce infrastructure at rest and can be used to make adjustments, add new charges, make reservations, perform recurring transactions, or perform other transactions in use. Tokenization protects card data when it’s in use and at rest. It converts or replaces cardholder data with a unique token ID to be used for subsequent transactions.
The sooner businesses implement encryption and tokenization the sooner stored unencrypted data will become a thing of the past.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Travel Agency Agents Tagged with: card, card data, card present, cardholder, compliance, credit card, customer, data, data breach, data security, e-commerce, EMV, encryption, Mail Order/Telephone Order, merchants, moto, payment, Payment Card Industry, PCI-DSS, POS, secure data, Security, terminal, tokenization, tokens, travel, travel merchants
December 7th, 2015 by Elma Jane
Most payments will probably be made with apps in phones or smartwatches in less than a decade from now, using NFC, biometrics or other mechanisms that don’t involve swiping or using plastic cards.
If your mobile device has an integrated NFC chip, you can use a mobile wallet app like Apple Pay and Android Pay to pay for items that support NFC transactions at a retail store. Simply wave your device near an NFC compatible terminal to pay, no card swiping required.
Both Apple Pay and Android Pay have fingerprint scanners on phones, you can enable payments with just a fingerprint scan.
In some countries, it’s easy for consumers to get credit cards with imbedded NFC chips. This means that you may be able to wave your card at the terminal instead of swiping, no phone required. In America, though, because NFC hasn’t caught on until recently, analysts expect that NFC via smartphone and smartwatch services such as Apple Pay and Android Pay will dominate contactless transactions in the next few years.
Just as credit cards replaced cash, credit cards will be replaced by digital payments which will continue to rely on the credit infrastructure but will obscure the plastic card itself.
As consumers, we love to see better products. When it comes to payments, we need Standards and Reliability.
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Near Field Communication, Smartphone Tagged with: biometrics, cards, contactless transactions, credit cards, digital payments, mobile wallet, nfc, NFC chip, payments, smartphone, terminal
November 17th, 2015 by Elma Jane
Within the payment processing industry, Merchant accounts are categorized according to how they process their transactions.
There are two primary merchant account categories:
Swiped (Card Present) and Keyed (Card-Not-Present).
Swiped or Card-Present Transactions: Are those in which both the card and the cardholder are present at the time the payment is processed, they physically swipe their customers credit card through a terminal or point-of-sale system.
The sub-categories within this group include:
Retail Merchants – Normally conduct their business in an actual storefront or office space. They primarily use counter-top terminals or Point-of-Sale systems. Restaurant Merchants – Requires a special set-up that allows for tips to be added to the final sale amount by settling the transaction with an adjusted price that will include the tip amount.
Wireless / Mobile Merchants – They use wireless terminals or mobile phones to run these transactions in Real-Time. Have the ability to accept credit cards transactions wherever they are located out on the road.
Hotel / Lodging Merchant – Will authorize a customer’s credit card for a certain sale amount.
Card-Present Transactions also include grocery stores, department stores, movie theaters, etc. Card acceptance settings where cardholders use unattended point-of-sale (POS) terminals, such as gas stations, are also defined as card-present transactions.
Keyed-In or Card-Not-Present Transactions: Whenever the transaction is completed and the cardholder (or his or her credit card) is not physically present to hand to the seller.
The sub-categories within this group include:
Mail Order / Telephone Order (MOTO) – The customers card information is gathered via over the phone, fax, email or internet and then manually key-entered into a terminal or payment gateway software. Once the transaction is approved and completed, the product is then shipped to the customer for delivery.
eCommerce / Internet – Conduct ALL of their business over the internet through a web site. So all credit card transactions are processed online via a payment gateway in real-time. The payment gateway is integrated into the web sites shopping cart. The cardholders card is charged instantly.
Travel Merchants is one example of Keyed or Card-Not-Present Transactions.
Start processing credit card payments today whether Swiped or Keyed.
Give us a call now at 888-996-2273 so more details!
Posted in Best Practices for Merchants, e-commerce & m-commerce, Mail Order Telephone Order, Mobile Payments, Mobile Point of Sale, Point of Sale, Smartphone, Travel Agency Agents Tagged with: Card Not Present transactions, card present, card-not-present, card-present transactions, cardholder, credit card, credit card payments, credit card transaction, ecommerce, keyed, Lodging Merchant, mail order, merchant accounts, merchants, mobile merchants, moto, payment gateway, payment processing, point of sale, POS terminals, Restaurant Merchants, Retail Merchants, shopping cart, swiped, telephone order, terminal, transactions, travel merchants
