Whatablessing....Understanding Your Merchant Account

April 13, 2012 - PRLog -- Whatablessing …Understanding Your Merchant Accounts

You may already know that your merchant account lets you accept credit and debit card transactions. What you may not know is how the process works, the fees and rates, or how you are paid. To save you aggravation and wasted money, here is a rundown of the process.
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The Process
If you already have a merchant account, or if you are thinking of getting one, you already know that the first step of credit card processing is when the customer swipes a card through a machine called a terminal or gateway. The rest of the process is a little more complicated.

1. The information from the terminal travels via an internet or phone connection to the acquirer, better known as the bank that runs your merchant account.

2.  The acquirer sends the information along to the proper credit card company.

3.  The credit card company checks to make sure that the cardholder has enough credit or money in their account to cover the charges.

4.  The credit card company then sends an authorization code to the acquirer. The code alerts the merchant service to accept the transaction that is taking place at the business.

5.  The merchant sends a signal to your terminal that tells you that the card was accepted so that you can complete the transaction.

6.  By this point, your customer is happy, but you aren't paid yet. Here is the process that gets the money into your merchant account.

7. All of the transactions for the day are stored up in a batch until the end of your business day. After closing shop, you send the batch of transactions to the bank through which you have a merchant account. This is called batching.

8. When the bank receives your request, it sends a request for payment to each credit card company.

9.  The card companies subtract interchange fees from the amount owed to you and then send the money electronically to the bank.

10. The bank subtracts its fees and then sends the money to your merchant account.

This entire process can take anywhere from 24 hours to several days.

The Fees and Rates
Now that you know how the credit card processing process works, you should know a little more about the fees that your merchant service charges you for the merchant account.

Each month you will have to pay a gateway, statement and monthly-minimum fee. The gateway fee is a flat charge for using the terminal to process cards. The statement fee is a charge for printing and sending you your monthly statement. The monthly minimum is a charge that is incurred only if you don't meet the minimum number of transactions required by your merchant account's contract.

The next type of fee you should know about is the transaction fee. This is the amount of money that the bank takes from each transaction. Most companies charge around $.20 to $.25 for each transaction.

With MatchRate Plus new Patent-Pending “Merchant Partner” Program you will receive a 25% Cash Rebate Monthly from your Credit Card Processing Fees. Learn more at: http://mrprebate.com. Use Agent ID: “whatablessing” when requesting more information.

Now that you know the ins and outs of a credit card transaction, there will be no surprises with your merchant account.