New Ways the Net Can
Boost Your Business
Merchant Accounts that Work with the Systems
When I first was interested in selling books online, I went to the folks who provided my merchant account and found out that they simply didn’t/wouldn’t let me use my account for online purchases. Other providers would do so but with extra costs and restrictions. If that was your experience a few years ago, take heart, things have changed.
In order to do business online, you simply have to take credit cards. Otherwise you lose the advantages of Web commerce and your Web site becomes a brochure that directs folks to take action someplace else. That may not be a bad thing, but it should be an option you choose.
In order to take credit card payments online you need three things. You need a merchant account that allows you to do online business. You also need a payment gateway and a shopping system that will work with it.
The shopping system produces the order form and encrypts it. It sends the authorization information through the payment gateway to the merchant account. Authorization (or decline) information is passed back through the gateway to your shopping system.
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