That is one of the main reasons why many businesses; small or big, turn to online to attract customers to their business. To ensure that you, as an online business owner instill some trust with your prospect, you must have a smooth process with your online payments. You also want to look professional to your customer when they are doing business with you. For this reason, you have to setup the merchant account quickly.

The top 3 reasons why you must get a merchant account include:

-Increase your customer base because by having a merchant account, you can collect your customer data for future promotions or announcement.

-When you have a merchant account, you will have the ability to accept major credit cards such as Amex, Visa and Mastercards. This will eventually increase your sales because more and more people worldwide are comfortable of doing their shopping online using their credit cards. However, your customers need to feel secure when doing the transaction with you. So, find a reputable merchant account and sign up for them.

- Across the border factor. If you have a merchant account, not only you can do business with your local customer but you will also be able to tap on customers from around the world. Eventually, you can see sudden increase in sales if more people can see your offer.

Merchant account provider will charge a certain fee when using their services but do not make them as a reason not to have a merchant account. Think about the benefits of having a merchant account to go along with your current or future businesses. Extra sales won’t hurt you, right?

What happens is:

⢠A customer to your e-commerce site presents a credit card to make payment for purchase of goods or services.

⢠This electronic request will immediately go to the âprocessing networkâ of the merchant account provider. Here verification of credit card will take place. If funds are available and the credit card is verified the system will send an electronic response to your website. Known as the â authorizationâ code, this guarantees you funds as payment for goods or services. The authorization code is a six digit number. This transaction will then be stored in the system

⢠At the end of a business day you must submit a âfinal requestâ of the dayâs business to the merchant account processing network. The processing network will then âsettle your batchâ or âcapture the funds.â The settlement report is systematic and lists payments received by card type âVisa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover etc.â Any errors must be immediately corrected.

⢠After this the funds will be deposited electronically to your bank account after deduction of the discount rate you have agreed to pay the merchant account provider.

⢠At the end of thirty days or the month the merchant account provider will send you a consolidated statement listing your activities and the associated fees charged to you.

Setting up a merchant account is not difficult. All you need to do is select a reliable merchant account service online from a website that has done considerable background checks on your behalf.

Merchant account providers charge their customers for the service. The fees are: a discount rate, a transaction fee, and monthly fees.

⢠A discount rate can range from 2.5-5% depending on your business and other factors.

⢠The transaction fee is a flat sum of say 30-50 cents a transaction.

⢠Monthly fees are charged of the service the merchant account provider gives. This is normally decided before signing the merchant account agreement.

In order to set up a merchant account you will need to provide the merchant account provider with details such as:

⢠Your name and business nomenclature.

⢠Details of your business checking account.

⢠A copy of a voided check.

⢠Articles of incorporation.

⢠Details of online business.

⢠A copy of your return policy and business structure.

⢠References from the trade.

⢠Tax returns (the latest).

⢠Copy of driverâs license and social security details.

⢠Details of any e-commerce association memberships.

The relationship between any business and the merchant account provider needs to be based on trust so choose your merchant account provider with care.