Hidden Fees to Watch Out for When Dealing With a Payment Gateway

When you are involved in an e-commerce business, you may come across certain unnecessary or hidden fees which can take away your businesses overall profit. However, at times some merchants may even fail to notice these hidden fees. To run the business smoothly for you and your customers, it is important to understand what exactly these hidden fees are. Whatever the fees you pay, your goal should be to ensure that you are not drowning your business with it.

So, here is a list of 2 hidden fees that merchants should watch out for. These are PCI compliance fee and transaction fee.

·      PCI compliance fee- PCI means Payment Card Industry. It is set of rules that all companies handling card and payment information is expected to follow, to minimize fraud and data breaches. You should be PCI compliant if your business accepts any form of card or check payments. The payments can either be online using a virtual terminal or can be using a credit card machine at physical store. There are some payment processors who can impose a PCI compliance fees for offering you resources and tools to help with PCI compliance but in case they don't offer this service, you should not be charged for this. Paying a PCI compliance fee can either come with benefits or lack of benefits. It all depends entirely on the type of processor you choose to work with.

·        Transaction fee-Transaction happens when you swipe a card or when you put your card details into a virtual payment portal or shopping cart. So, when you are charged for each of these transactions, it is called transaction fee. No matter which processor you chose, but you will always be charged a transaction fee. This transaction fees varies from one processor to another based on the amount of transactions every month. The transaction fee should not eat up your profits that is why it is recommended to first understand the charges associated per transaction and then choose the payment gateway solution which fits your business needs and most importantly your budget.

Conclusion

Understanding of these hidden fees will ensure you a high profit margin and help run your ecommerce business smoothly.  If you want to avoid paying hidden fees, you need to research and opt for the right processing company offering the best payment gateway solutions. Similarly, always review the agreement to get a clear understanding of the hidden fees. When signing up with a payment provider, clarify all the points. Careful understanding of the terms and conditions will help you avoid surprises in the future and help your company to be profitable.