I use a swipe Mini USB Swipe Card Reader and the plug-in is free. I recommend unitedbankservice.com, you can find the quickbooks link here http://unitedbankservice.com/quickbooks.html

Hi I would like more info on QuickBooks and the merchant services you mentioned on this post. Please feel free to eamail me at jwschraft@gmail.com. We just launched this week with a reverse merger 2ndry offering and need to get our books set up ASAP.

Thanks so much.

Jesse Schraft

Sam, I am a Quickbooks Consultant and your services can be used by my clients.
Talk to you soon (like next year) LUCKIEST

Good Day, I have been a retail merchant since 1982. I have probably only have had 4 or 5 different merchant account suppliers. This is an industry that is hard to shop for best value and profit for the merchant. For the last 5 or 6 years I have been having my processing done threw Sam's Club, believing that I was receiving a good discount rate. Basically from my current studying on this subject there are 2 ways to process. The first way is the tiered. You may be quoted a 1.7 discount rate ( for the standard charge card), but many of the charge cards that you recieve may be at a higher rate. My quoted rate from Sam's was 1.70% a fairly good rate. In the month of DEC last year my effective rate after interchange charges, service charges and fee's was 4.9%. A far cry from the 1.7% quoted. As of this weeks research I am believing that the "STRAIGHT PASS THROUGH" WAY of PROCESSING may be the least expensive or the most profitable for the retailer. In the end what you need to know is how much does it cost you to process charge cards. Total interchange charges plus service charges plus fees divided by the total you submitted = your effective rate. Good luck and be profitable.

There are some other considerations that you should keep in mind when searching for the right merchant account service, consider the following

Statement Fees - Does the merchant charge a fee for providing a monthly or annual statement to you?Monthly or Annual Minimums - Is there a minimum amount of money that you need to charge each month? What are the penalties if you do not charge this much money each month?

Technical Support Availability and Pricing - Is there a fee to speak with a technical support team member? Are customer service representatives available when you need to speak with them to answer a question?

Credit Card Terminal Costs - Will you or your clients be charged a terminal fee for each transaction at a credit card terminal? If so, what is this fee?Real-time Solution Price - If you require fast service for credit card processing, is there an additional charge?

Ease and Price of Installation - If you are using a credit card terminal or software application, is there a charge to install the technology? Are there additional fees based on usage? Can you return the technology if you decide not to use it?

What Technology Options are Available? - For transaction processing, accounting, customer relations, and more.

Hope this helps!

Dear Phanio,

I'm a little confused by your post comment " will allow merchant and retailers to negotiate their rates and terms". Merchants and retailers are one in the same. I'm guessing you meant "allow merchants and PROCESSORS" to negotiate rates...". This is already the case with most processors, has been for years.
"Interchange", the rate that Visa and MC charge to processors, is not negotiable, but this has nothing to do with the merchant. The rates and terms at which the processor re-sells the processing services to the merchant always has been negotiable. QuickBooks and Amex are two exceptions---their rates and terms are pretty cut and dried take-it-or-leave-it, which is their right and just a reflection on their marketing philosophy, nothing wrong with that. But merchants can choose to negotiate with dozens of ISO processors out there.

As far as QuickBooks being 'very expensive'....the answer to that is: it depends. Yes, QB charges $14.95 per month whereas normal merchant account monthly fees are maybe $5-$10. or so.BUT...QB comes with a built-in secure gateway for the same $14.95. Add a gateway separately @ $20 month via Verisign or Authorize.net (in addition to the $10 merchanta account fee) and the $14.95 is cheap. IIt should also be said that paying a few bucks extra a month in exchange for having no contractual obligation or early termination penalty is a wonderful value for the first time merchant who wants to test the waters or walk before he runs. QB providing free software, thus eliminating the need for the new merchant to spend a dime
leasing or buying processing software or equipment is also another major virtue.So as I said, whether or not QB is expensive depends on the specific situation at hand.

In short, we market QuickBooks Merchant Services as an excellent STARTER program for merchants just beginning with credit card processing. Used in that context, it can represent a very intelligent processing alternative for many merchants. By the same token, I would agree that any medium to large volume merchant would be much better suited to another processing solution.

FYI the link to sign up for a QuickBooks merchant account is:
https://merchant.intuit.com/signup/?b=ao319&p=bn2943*

This thread was started a long time ago but I think it's still relevant. Our business, which will be an online retail business, hasn't actually started yet. We're due to be "open" Nov. 1st, 09. We went ahead and got a merchant account and went with Quick Books/Intuit. We've done so much research on web hosts, web designers, tax structures etc that we went with Quick Books, without a lot of research into other options, because it was a familiar name, large company and we signed up through one of their affiliates we have a relationship with.
We recently had the account approved and from the experiences we've had so far I'm going to have to go with "Mistrgt" on this one. Maybe with all the aquisitions and mergers they've grown too large to actually provide any type of service.
1. When we applied for the account they asked what the "average" single purchase would be. Since we aren't actually in operation yet we came up with a number. After the account was approved it seems that this number is now the maximum limit and going over it will delay funding. We're a small, start up business and delays in funding could be a problem. That's a rather important limit for a small business and I think it should have been put differently on the application or at least explained. Maybe there was some fine print we missed on the app. It should have been in bold type.
2. Next we get emails saying the account is approved. One email from BusinessServices@intuit.com, that says congrats, give the account number and says log in to our web store and follow the store's instructions on how to link a merchant account. They provided link to their FAQs page and that was pretty much it. We also got an email from man with a return email address at superiorbankcard.com. This email said congrats, our merchant account for "Merchantlink" has been approved. It also gave the account number and a toll free number for support. At this point I'm wondering who the "Gateway Provider" is. So I send an email to the guy from superior bank card and ask who the gateway provider is because that's who I must set up in my shopping cart software. His reply email says in part, "{noformat}+First on your application you selected Merchantlink as you shopping
cart. That is the information you provided for us. If you are using a
different shopping cart please let me know.

Yes it is a little confusing, so let me explain.
Superiorbank card is a part of Innovative Merchant Solutions.
Recently Innovative Merchant Solutions was bought by Intuit. It made
sense; Intuit has the accounting software and we processed the credit
cards. Innovative Merchant Solutions is the credit card processing
division of Intuit. Intuit is in the process of branding its name on
products and letters to help ease the confusion. JP Morgan Chase and
WestAmerica are the banks we use to send the monies to you. "+

Merchantlink isn't my shopping cart. I can't remember what we selected as our cart because when we
started the app we hadn't decided on a cart so we saved it and came back to finish after we got a cart
set up. When we got the cart we finished the app. and may not have paged back to fill this info in. So
maybe it defaulted to Merchantlink but from what I can see they aren't a shopping cart company. Anyway,
I then shot off an email to Merchantlink for clarification and immediately after called Intuit support. The first
call I made the lady told me that Quick Books was my gateway provider, which I think is correct. The next
day I got an email from Merchantlink that said, in part,
"
+I just called the house and no one was in. However, I was able to call
your help desk at 1-800-558-9558 and confirm that you do use merchant
link as your gateway. I had to check with your help desk because not all
Intuit Quick book customers use Merchantlink as their gateway and since
I do not have knowledge of your set up ie if in your shopping cart if
Merchantlink as name would be listed or if there would be some other
name. Also we don't have any database here listing individual merchant
accounts; there was no way for me to check your MID and see if you
particularly are using our gateway. I was able to verify that via your
help desk. "+
So now I have 2 different answers. So I call back to Intuit where a lady tells me I can go to a web site that
she gave me the address to and I can choose any gateway provider I want. I explained the question again
and she said she would put me on hold while she cecked the make sure. When she returned she confirmed
the information and said to go to the web site and I can choose my gateway. I went to the site and it was one
where you can purchase a package deal for a host, store, merchant account all bundled together. Obviously
not what I wanted. (I'm not sure why they couldn't just look at my account number and see my information.)
So I called back and got another rep. who told me my gateway provider was Quick Books Merchant Services.
Quite frankly I'm scared to call back for any other answers.

3. At this point I was going to try and change our max. purchase limit so I went to the Merchant Services web
site thinking there would be some info on how to that exactly. There seems to be a lot of info on the web site
but not what I needed. Of course with that amount of info I may have overlooked it. I did searches for "Average
Single Charge Amount" and looked through all the FAQs and found nothing. I'm concerned because our
agreement states,

+"If Merchant exceeds the limit established by this Agreement, IMS may suspend processing, charge over
limit fees,hold the funds over the cap and/or return all Sales Drafts evidencing funds over the cap to Merchant.+

We can't live with the possibility that a customer or 2 may purchase the most expensive item on our site and
Intuit decides to do any of the above. So we sent a written request to the communications address listed in
our agreement. We explained the situation and asked for an increase in the max. single purchase. *Which
should be listed as "Maximum" and not "Average" if going over could have the listed ramifications.*
It's been over a week and we've not heard anything from them. Maybe they haven't had enough time to respond
but we're just about done. I cannot believe it's this complicated. It shouldn't be. I think the best thing to do is
close our account and apply with a different provider. Maybe a smaller company that might be better able to
communicate with a small business owner. I realize this was a long post and I apologize, but I wanted to give
specifics.

 

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