Online Payment Processors

Online payment processors are companies who offer businesses a way to accept and process credit and debit cards without dealing with each of the different card issuers directly.

Each of the companies reviewed offer a secure and encrypted (via SSL) environment. The most common way this is used is via a web interface where the business checkout process temporarily jumps to the processing website, to take the credit card details; the processor then passes control back to the business website, either to a confirmation page, or to a declined page. Alternatively a more complex, but seamless, method is for the business website to take and store credit card details, then pass these invisibly to the payment processor for validation. This type of processing would obviously require the business website to be extremely secure.

Your research may cover many of the payment processors available to UK businesses, submitting each to the same tests and scrutiny. As well as covering the main differences in accounts available, the results of my research have been split into categories that will be important to businesses requiring these services:

Account Availability
Fees
Set Up Fees
Ongoing Fees
Transaction Fees
Accessing Funds
Chargebacks
Trust and Support


Account Availability
For small to medium sized businesses, the market has become crowded with third party payment processors and it has become difficult to decide which is the most cost effective choice. But cost is not the only parameter that should be taken into consideration - security, customer service and the reputation of the third party payment processors should also figure highly.

For larger volume businesses, possibly the cheapest method would be to use your own merchant account. If you already have a merchant account with your bank, then you can upgrade this to accept payments via the Internet. The following company is one of the more recognised third party payment processors who will process the credit card transactions for you