Say my client is a hair stylist and is looking to bill clients right after doing someone's hair. Would I go the merchant account route or the online "Paypal" route for storing customer "profiles" and CC info?
i can't imagine how you might do this for a hair salon without an online application/interface. So if you do go online, you should use a merchant process (you pick there is thousands) and authorize.net. Authorize provides what they call a CIM - Customer Information Manager. It will allow you to store all of the customer's necessary information for charging in a profile. This profile can be charged as often as your merchant process allows. Typically they will have limits on the number of times you can charge the same card in a 30 day period. Now you can log into authorize and manually charge customer when ever you want. Or you can integrate into a application or ecommerce solution and charge through that. Most pre-built software will use authorize because it has been around so long. Hope that helps.
As I understand, the CIM is ~$20/mo + the $20/mo for the merchant processing service. Would I then need to find a gateway or does the CIM act as a gateway? Also, what's the appeal of going with a $40/mo service (+ 2.5% + $0.30 per transaction fee) as opposed to going with Paypal or Google Checkout?
That's sounds about right, I want to say we pay $15 for each. It does not include a merchant process, you will need to get that separately. Authorize does allow you to sign up for both. If you choose to go with them they will try to send you through First Data first, which is the largest merchant processor in the country. Good service but you will probably get better rates finding someone yourself. As far as the why goes, we do because it improves are margins. The rates you mention are industry standard if you have not shopped around. You can find better deals tho. For example we pay 0.5% on all transaction + $0.10. The only other charge from our merchant is a $10 statement fee. This is ridiculously good tho, and we price check a lot of companies before we got this rate. With that said, your salon needs to do the math. If you are only doing $100 per month in transactions it's still cheaper to go with paypal or google checkout. One more thing I would suggest is do your research on PP and GC. I know several very good reputable companies that have had their accounts closed or frozen. When this happens funds are usually held or refunded the customer.
Wow, that is a good rate. My client's business is actually not a salon. In that case, want to point me towards a particular provider?
which company is it that charges only 0.5% +$0.10 per transaction? Love to check it out, sounds really good.
http://www.worsecreditcardprocessors.com/msd.htm This was his recommendation. I'm quite skeptical and I don't know why he would PM me the company if it's so good.
Check this out - http://spokane.bbb.org/find-busines...Service/credit-card-processing-service/99206/ if this relevant to your location at all, if not, Change it
I sent you a PM because I included the guys email address / phone number and I did not want him to get spammed. As for his BBB rating, all I can say is I have used them for the last 6 months without problem. I have also sent several of our customers to him and never heard a complaint. I don't receive any affiliate commissions, I'm just trying to help out with good information. You still need to do your own research and decide for yourself. You can take that or leave it for what it's worth.