new small biz, looking for merchant services

I'm starting up a very small biz, just a two-man operation. We're looking for the ability to process credit cards face to face, online, email, phone, etc.

Is paypal a good option? Seems like every merchant service I've looked at is loaded with setup fees, monthly fees, etc.

Paypal has a $20 per month fee for a virtual terminal, just wondering what anyone's experience with them has been, or if anyone can recommend an inexpensive merchant service.

thanks!

 

Paypal is a good place to start for a new business. The virtual terminal works like a normal virtual terminal that you would see with a traditional payment gateway. I haven't heard of a lot of retail businesses using paypal for face to face transactions, because a swipe rate is much lower paypal's rate, but if you do a lot of internet and keyed transactions it would be a good match for you.

A few things to pay attention to:
Your customers will see paypal on their credit card statement, so this is something you should make them aware of. Otherwise it can lead to Chargebacks, or at least paypal's version of them.

Secondly, if you do a decent volume of face to face transactions, you may want to look at a retail type merchant account. The fees would be quite a bit lower than paypal, but you would need a credit card terminal to swipe your cards through.

Let me know if you have any questions related to the subject.

 

Thanks for the help.

I'm selling ad space on a website, we're going to aggressively market it door to door. I don't need the ability to "swipe" cards, just looking to be able to take someone's info and process it later online. Is this what I can do with Paypal?

Good info on letting the customers know Paypal will show up on their statement. Thanks!

 

The virtual terminal will allow you to key the transactions in manually. If you are mobile, you will need to call back to someone who can process the card online, or if you collect the credit card info, you can process it later. It may be easier to imprint your customers card and process it later when you have access to the internet.

 

You can check SafePaySolutions.com too. I'm happy with them (I can't use PAyPal bec. my country is not allowed)