"Specifications, Bidding and Interviews Consulting Service "
If you do not know the specifics of the merchant account industry you could be loosing up to $5,000 per year or more in credit card processing fees.
 As a business owner you really want your
merchant service provider to give you the best rates that he
can give you. If you are going to be processing only $15,000 a
month you could be paying $100 or more a month with the wrong
processor, that equals $1,200 a year. Typically, when a sales
person is speaking with you about a merchant service for your
business they give you the qualified, retail rates and pretend
that you will process all credit cards within those rates and
fee schedule. It is not their fault that some of the
transactions fall outside those boundaries. This is the
trap that makes it look like they are giving a very
good rate when you look at the application or their fee
schedule. This assumption is sometimes very far from the
truth.
Some of the other fees that
really does need to be mentioned are mid-qualified rates,
non-qualified rates, AVS fees, batch fees, statement fees,
transaction fees, reprogramming fees, annual fees, membership
club fees, IVR fees, 800 and/or 900 surcharge fees and
many more. With the additional hidden fees a merchant account
provider can give away free equipment and other items because
they are making their profit on the back end. The sales
person may also decide to raise your rates in a couple of
months. As the old saying goes, "You
get what you pay for",
which is true most of the
time. I would prefer to see good honest rates and fees on the
merchant services and a good price on the credit card
processing equipment.
When a business owner is trying to get
the bottom dollar out of the sales person, that is ok. The problem starts when that sales
person has gone below what they should on the front end of the
fees or prices and then they have to make it up
on the back end. The back end fees are very seldom mentioned so
therefore can be changed at will by the provider or sales person. Some times
the back end are related to additional fees of the merchant account
and other times it is related to customer service and
technical support. When the fees are too low on the front then
they will charge for customer service and technical support
when before it was free with the standard
rates.
Knowing the fine lines of negotiating is almost
an art. A lot of the negotiating is knowing where the sales
person's cost is and being able to gauge where those fine
lines are through the conversation and/or body language. This
is where we become the experts and specialize in the
interviewing process. Once we have the proper information then
the decision making has become a much easier process for
choosing a merchant service provider. The details and the
specifications give us an even playing field for each sales
person to price their presentation. When all these levels of
preparation and delivery have gone through the proper thinking
process then the total objective is reached much easier.
THE OBJECTIVE: "Receive good rate and fee schedules
for front end and back end merchant service charges without
sacrificing the prices for the credit card processing
equipment." We want a win - win situation for the business
owner and the sales
person.
COST = $999.00 plus travel expenses.
Bidding, Specifications, Phone Interviews, Presentation, Recommendation and Decision.
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