Have you thought about starting your own online business but you weren't sure how to receive credit card or debit card payments? The solution to this problem is to open your very own merchant account. A merchant account acts as a payment gateway allowing your customers to submit payments for their goods or services online electronically.
Customers prefer paying electronically because it's much safer than mailing in a check or money order via snail mail. There is also more fraud protection offered to them if they use credit or debit cards. If you have never used a merchant account before they are very efficient and easy to set up too.
Why Open a Merchant Account?
There are plenty of reasons why businesses operating online should open a merchant account. It will make the checkout process easy for your customers and allow them to submit their personal payment and shipping information in a confidential manner.
Other important reasons to consider opening a merchant account include:
Superior Fraud Protection. Merchant account providers are very aware of the risk of identity theft when shopping online. This is why they're always up-to-date on the latest and greatest fraud protection software. This software is utilized to keep payment information secure during the checkout process. Your customers won't have to worry about their financial information floating around the web for everybody to see.
No Need for Your Customer to Be Redirected to Another Site. Every now and then while shopping online, you'll come across a website that redirects you to a different site to finish the payment process. This can be a bit unnerving to customers to say the least. With a merchant account, your customers can complete payment without ever leaving your site. The payment information they enter is automatically submitted to your merchant account behind the scenes as soon as they complete checkout.
Payments Are Processed Quickly and Easily. You simply cannot process credit cards, debit cards or electronic checks without some type of merchant account. Since customers prefer to pay electronically these days, it's important to have a variety of electronic payment methods that you can accept.
Receive 24/7 Support. Your merchant account provider will do their best to ensure that your payment gateway is up and working at all times. However, if you do have a problem at any point in time simply contact them and they'll be there to guide you and answer any questions. Their customer service is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
Easy to Implement. If you're worried about the setup process of a merchant account being too complicated, rest assured that it is not. Your provider will tell you exactly what you need to do and the entire process is relatively quick and easy to set up. You don't have to be technologically advanced to get everything up and running smoothly.
If you don't have a merchant account you can pretty much guarantee that your business will not receive the number of sales it could with the addition of a merchant account. It's important that online businesses are able to accept payments electronically. This is important for the customer as well because it allows their orders to be processed much faster. Now that you know some of the great benefits of having your own merchant account, it's time to make the dream of owning your own Internet business come true.
Author Resource:
If you don't have a merchant account yet I have a list of information for you about the different companies like Merchant Warehouse .
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