Garage door industry magazine for garage door dealers, garage door manufacturers, garage door distributors, garage door installers, loading docks, garage door operators and openers, gates, and tools for the door industry.
Issue link: https://idoi.epubxp.com/i/134362
sales&Marketing; mobile Payments: more Freedom, more Choices, New Criteria By Erica N. Baker Last issue, Mobile Payments: Beyond Early Adopters detailed the mobile payment industry's rapid growth rate. New technology generally becomes more popular at an exponential rate, meaning that not only will mobile payment transactions become more and more popular; the rate at which their popularity grows will increase as well. Conservative estimates predict that mobile payment transactions will reach $225 billion by 2015. If you are part of one of the many businesses incorporating mobile payment methods into their payment acceptance options, you may have noticed that the same criteria used to evaluate traditional credit card processing is different than the criteria used for mobile payment solutions. That's because a lot of mobile payment providers are fnding that it's to their fnancial advantage to restructure the payment processing rates for mobile payments, rather than integrating mobile with established payment processing systems. The frst four criteria you should evaluate, Scope, Quality, Cash Flow, and Pricing, are detailed below. Scope • Does this solution provide or integrate with other payment processing and accounting systems, including software and shopping carts? • Does this solution require manual entry for accurate accounting, or can you use tools you already have in your offce to upload whole batches of transactions? • What happens when you have to key in transactions using this solution? Will you overpay? While fat-rate, plain solutions are valuable for hobbyists and very small businesses with small ticket sizes, they tend to be much more expensive and inappropriate for established larger ticket businesses. Payment processing solutions that offer more than one option for payment acceptance add a level of fexibility to your business. This kind of services offers multiple solutions under one umbrella, so that you only have to manage one merchant account. Quality • Is this solution robust enough to handle real volume? • What are the benefts the mobile payment solution actually provides your business? • Is this solution one-size- fts all? Is it a personalized solution? Just as other payment processing solutions combine products (equipment) and services (processing), so do mobile payment acceptance options. Equipment affects your processing costs. When a terminal or card reader breaks, business personnel are forced to key in credit card data instead of using a traditional swipe method. When data is keyed, it inherently costs your company more. This is one strategy that mobile payment processing providers use to collect additional revenue to offset, and proft from, providing "free" equipment that is likely to break. We will discuss additional methods which are hidden within the quality of service and pricing structures. Continued on page 61 V o l u m e 4 6 i s s u e 3 2 0 1 3 59