Cheapest Merchant Account available for credit card payments

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sartay

Registered User
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Hi all,

There are a good few threads on this general topic area already so apologises if anyone thinks I'm duplicating slightly but the other threads didn't quite answer my question.

I am looking for the cheapest merchant account available from the banks for processing credit cards on a website. We are going with Realex as the processor, but just need to select a merchant account. (We don't want to go for Paypal or an all in one package, so it's just advice on a merchant account that I would be grateful for).

Been quoted the following from Bank of Ireland/Elavon:

One off set up fee - €199 plus VAT
Ongoing charges are 2.05% of transactions on credit cards or a flat rate 25 cent for each Laser card transaction
€30 monthly minimum charge

This is based on a credit card turnover of €30,000 for the first year and an average transaction amount of €24.99.

Is this a good price or can it be beaten elsewhere? It doesn't seem particularly cheap but I'm as far as I'm aware, AIB charge in and around much the same. Does anybody know of any cheaper alternatives?

Many thanks.
 
Checked with AIB for definite and they are quoting much the same. Ulster Bank say it will take 48 hours for someone to get back to me (great service!).

Is this pretty much the extent of the competition for this service? Just wondering if I'm not thinking of someone else obvious?
 
Just checked this myself recently. AIB quoted 2.5% on Cr Card transactions and 25c on Laser card transactions. €25 monthly for equipment & €30 min fee monthly. Also set up fee of €190.

Bank of Ireland quoted 2.5% Cr card, 31c Laser card, €22 Equipment rental and min fee €30 per month. Set up fee €99.

Ulster Bank were to get back to me - still waiting - that was 3 weeks ago!

BOI were most informative and spoke about doing it online but told me that the charges would be more or less the same. We've decided not to run with it. It would have been handy but the cost in the first year would have been €459 and €360p/a thereafter. Too expensive for us.
 
Lorz said:
Just checked this myself recently. AIB quoted 2.5% on Cr Card transactions and 25c on Laser card transactions. €25 monthly for equipment & €30 min fee monthly. Also set up fee of €190.

Bank of Ireland quoted 2.5% Cr card, 31c Laser card, €22 Equipment rental and min fee €30 per month. Set up fee €99.

Ulster Bank were to get back to me - still waiting - that was 3 weeks ago!

BOI were most informative and spoke about doing it online but told me that the charges would be more or less the same. We've decided not to run with it. It would have been handy but the cost in the first year would have been €459 and €360p/a thereafter. Too expensive for us.
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Thanks for that. Much the same as I what I was told then. I just wanted to be sure I hadn't missed another bank that might offer it. I contacted National Irish in the end too as I found out that they do it too, but they also still have to get back to me! Crazy isn't it, when I'm sure Ulster Bank and National Irish must have standard enough pricing that they give out easily enough over the phone.
 
BetterBiz said:
Other options are http://www.worldpay.ie (www.worldpay.ie) and [broken link removed] might be worth looking at but I'm not too sure of their pricing
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Thanks for that, just called Worldpay.ie and thought I'd put up the info here in case it's of use to someone else at some stage.

€145 set up fee
€20 monthly charge (includes no transactions)
3.95% on credit card transactions (although they offered to drop that to 3.5%)
80c flat rate per Laser card

It's a probably a good option for when you're starting out with a small turnover as the fixed costs are lower than having to pay both a bank and the likes of Realex etc both a minimum monthly fee of approx €30 each.

But the cost per transaction is a good bit higher so once you start doing higher volumes it would probably make sense to switch to separate merchant account and gateway providers at that point.
 
One other option to consider for low-volume, or those just starting out is PayPal.

Regarding Worldpay, I think one thing to check on there is when you get your money from any transactions - it used to be only once a month. May not be an issue for you.
 
can't recommend Paypal.. Irish customers have problems due to their automated address checking system, (can't be overridden by humans and results in lifetime bans).. also their silly system of address verification, advertised as three simple steps which are not simple.
 
Yeah, I've heard too much negative feedback about Paypal to go with it I think, but thanks for the suggestion.

National Irish Bank just got back to me (didn't ask me any questions about the business apart from whether we would require a physical terminal, so I've no idea why they don't make their prices more readily available but anyhoo!!). They don't have a minimum monthly charge apparently! Which would make them extremely attractive to people starting out. I asked the lady to confirm that a couple of times as I was surprised by it but she said they was definitely no monthly minimum.

Their other fees are:

€250 set up fee
Laser card - 25c
Credit cards - 2.5% of transactions

Does anybody have any experience of using National Irish Bank? Based on their quoted fees I'd be inclined to give them a go - although I obviously don't want to select purely on price, I want to make sure their service is good etc.
 
Hmm, scrap that actually!! The woman just rang me back about two minutes later to say that actually they can't deal with us after all! I mentionned that we were a start up. She said that because of that, National Irish wouldn't deal with us and that we would have to go to Ulster Bank.

Apparently both Ulster Bank and National Irish are both agents for Royal Bank of Scotland. She said that new businesses have to have someone come out to visit the business premises and as only Ulster Bank have customer reps on the road, we would then have to go through Ulster Bank.

???

It's nice when companies keep things simple isn't it? :)
 
Have National Irish a monthly equipment fee also or do they accept paper transactions?
 
dont pay more than 25c for laser,2% for visa,mastercard(was at 2.5% but a simple phone call reduced it to 2%.
they are the rates i pay at present.with ulster by the way and always found them helpful to be honest
 
Diddles said:
dont pay more than 25c for laser,2% for visa,mastercard(was at 2.5% but a simple phone call reduced it to 2%.
they are the rates i pay at present.with ulster by the way and always found them helpful to be honest
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Thanks. Finally got speaking to the Ulster Bank rep today. He said the same as you there. 25c for laser, 2.5% for credit cards. I'll go back and ask for 2% now though :)

There's also no monthly minimum charge either so I think we have a winner!
 
Hi All

I got rid of my AIB Merchant Service Account because

Minimum Charge was €60 pm
Terminal Charge was €35 pm (incl vat)
Visa / Cr Charge was 2.5%

A complete rip off considering I had signed up for my terminal on 11th Nov 2000 and didn't receive it till November 2002 ......

Even after I had cancelled the account Feb 2009 and it had been picked up (I got a receipt) March 2009 they wrote to me 2mths later to tell me they hadn't received my terminal back and would charge my Bank Account €1500 if I didn't return it !!!!

Obviously I got a prompt retraction when i faxed them my receipt that it had been picked up ......

Great Service - I don't think so .............
 
Hi Sartay, Ulster Bank (in Ireland) sold their merchant business to an organisation called Streamline (in the UK) last year. I dealt with UB for two years and found them okay. Streamline are a bit different though. Transactions usually reach business account in two days.
 
missthrifty said:
Hi Sartay, Ulster Bank (in Ireland) sold their merchant business to an organisation called Streamline (in the UK) last year. I dealt with UB for two years and found them okay. Streamline are a bit different though. Transactions usually reach business account in two days.
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I have been looking into trying to get a Merchant Account for a start up on line business but it is proving difficult.
Streamline appears to be pay of Worldpay.

Streamline will be my next port of call.
 
I thing this the cheapest merchant account. Processing fee is very low. Monthly minimum charge is average. Merchant account charges are depending on the transaction and the services.
 
Merchant Accounts

Also looking for alternative Merchant account... came across this review> just google merhanct account reviews and credit card processing review toptenreviews - (apparently I have to have 15 post or more before I can include url) -fair enough.... which gives a review of all the companies avilable. One comapny is Merchant Wareouse. Not sure if these companies deal in Ireland. However Verotel deals with Euro but does not have a good rating. Most importantly you should not pay more than 2.5% commission, 25c per laser and around €30 for monthly statement.

Also just came across two Irish Companies, Worldnet.com and payzone. Will check these out.

Thanks for all the useful tips...
 
WorldNet have just launched a new product called Payjack that some people viewing this thread might be interested in.

It's aimed at small businesses and sole traders in Ireland, particularly those who'd like to be able to take card payments in different locations.

You don't need a terminal as it works using an app on your smartphone.

As people are saying, the banks can be very slow to get back to you on getting a merchant account. But Payjack has an online application and offers approval in 48 hours.

Pricing is:
€95 set-up
€25 per mth
3% transaction
 
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