Card Payments

Square/iZettle

Oh boy, well what are you trying to do here?

What kind of business is it? Different businesses receive different interchange rates. Some payment processors (E.g. square) will simplify this into a flat rate, but others will charge you that, plus a merchant bank fee, and maybe an equipment fee.

Processors with dedicated equipment will charge different amounts for different types of transactions. Do you expect it to be a 50-50 split between debit and credit? Premium credit cards with more benefits can charge higher fees to the merchant, which get passed on to you.

Your scenario makes you either a candidate for a portable solution (which uses bluetooth or the like to another device), or a mobile one (which just uses the mobile network directly). The latter is more reliable, but then you need some sort of data plan for the point of sale itself.

IMO, Square/flat fee is probably a miss for your transactions. You'd have to do card processing on the phone, that makes signatures awkward as well as PIN entry, and the phone is expensive too. You're better off with something that's portable but dedicated equipment with a digital signature screen and a PINpad.

>>57043820 here
So I ran a quote on a website with the following estimates
>average transaction volume: 6000 GBP a month, 200 GBP average transaction size (smaller end)
>60% debit, 20% credit, 20% premium credit
>all transactions happen via card present (NFC or chip, but no manually keying in numbers)
>need a mobile terminal that can process cards on the go, passing it either to wifi or bluetooth

The cheapest quote I got on this basis was approximately 65 GBP a month
>estimated 40.44 GBP in card fees
>18.60 GBP/mo for equipment (card reader)
>5.89 for misc account fees (security, plus a three pence fee for every authorization).

The equipment in this deal would be a Spire SPw60. Hardwire Ethernet or wifi connection, color screen, sign on the screen, inbuilt PIN PAD, contafctless supported. Funds settle in three days.

That would put your cost of card acceptance at 65GBP for 6,000 GBP in transactions, or a little over one percent. This doesn't include any chargebacks (harder with chip-and-pin) or refunds (50 cents apiece).

Now, you go the cheap route, let's say you buy the reader from Paypal for 48 GBP. But then you're going to spend 1.5% - 2.75% of transaction per swipe. You're still subject to fees for chargebacks. You don't get a rate below 2.75% until you've processed more than 6000GBP a month. Let's say you do achieve this and you pay a 2% fee instead (you don't break 15K GBP a month). 2% of .02 is $120 a month, and the Paypal hardware is not as impressive as the Spire Spw60.

There are pros and cons to each, but generally dedicated equipment will give you a better experience, particularly if you look to integrate with point of sale hardware later.

>>57043941
neat, thanks.

>>57043941
>2% of .02
Meant 2% of 6000GBP, but I'm sure you got my point.
If you process cards sporadically or for smaller amounts, Paypal or square or whatever can be great deals with simple pricing, no monthly fees, etc... but if you're going to have reliable transaction volumes, especially in the amounts you're talking (150GBP or more per swipe), you'd probably be best served by doing some competitive pricing.

By the way, I found all of this by googling "UK credit card processing" and picking a comparison site (and checking paypal's site) and the information from your OP post. It's pretty simple.

>>57043979
I think your biggest choice is the vendor. The estimates given the numbers above are all really within 75 GBP. You may prefer the reader one vendor gives more. Wifi is one solution but then you're dependent on the battery life of the phone in addition to that of the terminal itself. If you get one with GPRS/GSM, then you're good wherever you have cell reception.

It looks like a terminal that processes via GSM is often only a 1.50 GBP more than one that processes via wifi. That may be worth it just for flexibility and being able to turn the unit on and have it work. Also, judging by the notes on this comparison site, the cost of the GSM service for the unit is typically included in the rental of the equipment (data amounts for credit card authorization are tiny, it's not watching youtube or anything like that). You might consider doing that over wifi if you don't have reliable wifi or travel a lot.