Category Archives: managing costs

managing the cost of credit card processing for merchants

What is Auth Code 51, declined?

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A credit card processing response of Auth Code 51, is a decline for insufficient funds, the credit limit has been exceeded. What happens when the customer says, “there’s nothing wrong my Visa card, put it through again”? If put through again without a voice authorization, the merchant is at risk for chargeback of funds for invalid authorization.

Visa Product and Service Rules, 8.4.1.3 Original Credit Transactions – Prohibition against Clearing a Declined Transaction

An Originating Member must not send an Original Credit Clearing Transaction if it received a Decline Response to the corresponding Authorization Request.

Further information at page PSR-564, 11.1.16 Chargeback Reason Code 71 – Declined Authorization. NEW. Effective for Transactions completed on or after 15 April 2016,
A Transaction for which Authorization was obtained after a Decline Response
was received for the same purchase. This does not include an Authorization
Request that received a Pickup Response 04, 07, 41, or 43 or was submitted
more than 12 hours after the submission of the first Authorization Request.

This period is known as the black hole or dark period. For the first 12 hours after a decline, merchants should not attempt to process the same retail transaction. The reality is a consumer could simply walk away and go back to another cashier and try again. Some cloud based payment gateways will enable merchants to choose to prohibit multiple attempts in the black hole period.

Disclaimer: The rules of card acceptance are very complex. Merchants should read the manual for complete details regarding card acceptance for your business type.

Distributor EMV Credit Card Terminals – Profit busters, profit boosters

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Distributors have special needs for retail credit card processing to maximize profits and mitigate risk. Here we identify credit card terminals that are certain fall short on delivering in an EMV environment. The two most critical retail needs are requiring customers to comply with the highest security supported, and supporting level III processing. Additionally, P2PE, encrypting at the terminal head, is important for a security and compliance.

Only cloud payment solutions have the potential to meet the primary distributor retail processing needs.  This precludes all First Data terminals, one of the most popular brands distributed, and similar devices. DISCLAIMER: comments are specifically regarding business to business needs, not all retail industry needs, and are not in any way intended to imply anything negative about the terminals.

The terminals below DO NOT meet the two most critical distributor needs to maximize profits.

verifone vx520 emv terminal

Verifone vx520

Clover Mini by First Data

Clover Mini by First Data

First Data FD35 EMV pin pad terminal

First Data FD35 EMV PinPad, attaches to a variety of FD terminals.

Ingenico iCT250 emv capable countertop terminal.

Ingenico iCT250 emv capable countertop terminal.

magtek mini card swiper

Magtek mini card swiper.

The terminals below have the POTENTIAL meet the two most critical distributor needs to maximize profits. Special certifications and payment gateway logic is required.

ingenico isc250 signature capture terminal

Ingenico isc250 EMV

 

verifone MX915 EMV terminal

Verifone MX915 EMV chip terminal

Fraud liability review for MasterCard, American Express, and Discover (credit and debit)

  • If the card is chip & sign, and the terminal is EMV only, the card issuer is liable
  • If the card is chip & pin, and the terminal is EMV without pin, or pin debit without EMV, the merchant is liable
  • If the card is chip & pin, and the terminal is EMV with pin, the issuer is liable
  • If the terminal supports EMV & pin, but the customer uses chip & sign, the merchant is liable. Acquirers generally support chip and pin bypass to chip and signature. Merchants should only use solutions that require the highest security on every transaction, including prohibiting customer bypass.
  • If the terminal supports EMV & pin, but the customer does chip & sign, the merchant is liable.

Merchants should only use solutions that require the highest security on every transaction, including prohibiting customer bypass.

If you want to enhance your customer experience, make a change that also maximizes profits too.

Christine Speedy, CenPOS global sales and integrated solutions reseller, 954-942-0483. CenPOS is a merchant-centric, end-to-end payments engine that drives enterprise-class solutions for businesses, saving them time and money, while improving their customer engagement. CenPOS? secure, cloud-based solution optimizes acceptance for all payment types across multiple channels without disrupting merchant banking relationships. Keep your processor, upgrade your technology! Quick and easy to implement with no long term contract.

Why should B2B CFO’s, business consultants and accountants partner with a B2B payments consultant?

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Financial consultants from CPA’s to business advisors can increase profits by partnering with outside experts. A business to business payments consultant will help financial consultants differentiate services offered to win more business and increase retention. Get clients paid faster, cheaper, and more securely, and they’ll reward you with their loyalty and refer you more business.

REAL RESULTS FROM COMPANIES USING MY TECHNOLOGY

  • Reduced DSO from 45 days to 15 days
  • Reduced merchant fees 34%- with the same merchant account
  • Exposed long-term internal fraud by trusted employee at a $2B+ company
  • Reduced internal accounting staff by 20%
  • Reduced cashier staff by 30%
  • Improved customer experience, directly increasing revenue per customer, and manufacturer bonus rebates

My core expertise is cloud-based financial transaction technology critical to staying current with regulatory and compliance changes, and the resulting impact on risk management, cash flow, and EBITDA. Examples of payment acceptance types can include credit card processing, check processing, ACH, wire, and others.

Why Christine Speedy? The industry is loaded with people selling substandard payment acceptance solutions, particularly B2B merchant services because they don’t know any better or they put themselves first. For example,

  • Web developers tell you to use either authorize.net or Payflow Pro payment gateway because they’re ‘reliable’ and they’ve had good results. Yes, they’re reliable, but so are others that provide far better customer and merchant experiences, while also maximizing profits.
  • US banks don’t have retail solutions enabling B2B merchants to qualify for the lowest interchange rate possible for purchasing, business, and corporate cards so they sell substandard alternatives. For example, building supply and distribution companies that cater to businesses pay millions in extra fees because of inadequate technology.
  • Industry associations offer member benefits for services in which they profit share; these ‘exclusive trusted partners’ are kept at all costs, even if it’s not the best service for their members.
  • Merchant salespeople tell you it’s Ok to store credit card authorization forms in a locked file drawer. No, it’s not. It’s never ok to store sensitive cardholder data in any format, but they don’t have a solution to fix your reason for storing it.

You need a trusted, confidential resource.

WHAT I DO: Analyze, recommend, sell new or modify existing solutions

Part 1: What is the revenue picture?

  1. Types and costs of payments accepted
  2. How and where are payments accepted? Who touches? Credit, collections, and treasury management (risk, currency) reviewed.
  3. Software and hardware
  4. Security and PCI Compliance at a glance- I can typically uncover problems in 100% of businesses within 5-10 minutes of probing.

Part 2: What are merchant business priorities in next 3-6-12 months?

These do not have to be related to part 1, but are critical to understanding business.

Part 3: Action items

Based on account review and priorities, what are critical and non-critical action items? How will these impact efficiency, security, profits, customer experience? What vendor, hardware, software changes are recommended?

MERCHANT SERVICES WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW NOW

US EMV chip card implementation is impacting every company that accepts credit cards, retail and card not present. This is the biggest change since Durbin (debit), and again, there’s loads of misinformation and poor recommendations being made.

TARGET MARKETS

Minimum $5M-100 annual revenue, sweet spot; Clients include $1M to $2B. Manufacturer, distribution, technology, dealer, anything B2B.

NO THANK YOU – No supermarkets, restaurants, education, fuel or travel agencies

FREE TEST – While credit card processing may be a small portion of cash flow in target markets, it’s also a pain point I can typically help with immediately. Send 2 consecutive merchant statements for any B2B company you’re satisfied is as profitable as possible. If you like my report, we can go deeper into full analysis.

3 Profit Boosters for Lumber, Building Materials, Distribution Companies

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Lumber, building materials, and distribution companies increase profits and cash flow almost instantly with these credit card processing and accounts receivable tips.

  1. Use a credit card processing solution that supports level III processing for retail. Prior to the October 2015 EMV liability shift, there were more companies that offered this, but today, to my knowledge, we offer the only solution that has both US EMV and level 3 retail certification.
    level 3 processing interchange rate

    Sample interchange rates for the same credit card transaction; Failing to qualify for level III is costly.

    Benefit: Potential 1% or more profit margin increase.  TIP: No countertop credit card terminal supports level 3 due to the data that must be sent with transactions; no bank currently offers a level 3 retail solution with US EMV. A cloud-based payment gateway is required.

  2. Ensure key entered transactions are sent for authorization with the MOTO (mail order, telephone order) transaction type indicator. If not, the transaction will default to the highest ‘non-qualified’ interchange rate possible for the card type, and in the event of a dispute, merchant must be able to produce a signed receipt.  TIP: Never key enter on a countertop terminal since it is set up for RETAIL. VX520 emv NFC verifone terminalThe best solution manages proper presentment for processing automatically so employees don’t need to understand the nuances of the best way to process any transaction to qualify for lower rates or mitigate risk.
  3. Enable online payments, with level III credit card processing. By empowering customers to pay 24/7, they’ll pay faster to clear up credit lines to buy more. Also, with cardholder authentication, payment can sometimes be guaranteed against fraud and qualify for even lower interchange rates due to lower risk; key entered transactions carry more risk and while risk can be mitigated, payment is not guaranteed. Accepting alternative methods like ACH, wire, and Paypal will also reduce friction, increase efficiency and increase cash flow.
On the surface negotiated rates are often great, but the right tools are critical to qualify transactions for maximum profits.  The building supply industry, including plumbing, electrical, lumber, windows, doors, stone, marble, flooring, insulation, lighting, fencing, roofing, gutters, appliances and more will greatly benefit from 3D Merchant Services solutions and consulting expertise. Free trial to measure the value with existing merchant account.

Wholesale Distribution Industry Profits Impacted by Payment Processing Partners

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Popular Industry Association Business Service Partners Fail To Keep Up With Changing Payment Needs

December 7, 2015–  Wholesale distributors may rely on association negotiated payment processing for reduced rates, but associations are admittedly not payment experts. In fact, other than comparing rates on paper, that lack of expertise and or lack of desire to make a change, could result in compressed profits as we head into 2016 and beyond. EMV chip card acceptance affects both retail and card present businesses.

“The EMV chip card terminal directly impacts interchange rate qualification, and none of the most popular terminals recommended today meet critical wholesale distributor requirements,” says Christine Speedy, B2B payments expert.

Why? Managing the entire payment process is crucial to impact the biggest component of fees – card interchange.  Interchange rates are non-negotiable, but they can be influenced. There are hundreds of fees that can be tacked on based on each transaction type. Due to complexities, distributors must have an intelligent solution to manage the payment process and ensure compliance with all the rules.

PURCHASING CARDS

To qualify for the lowest interchange rates, transactions must meet all the rules for the specific card and transaction method. For distributors, processing level III data for Corporate, Purchasing, and Business cards is critical. Their card use is growing and savings of 90 basis points or more for some cards is an attractive margin difference worth achieving.

mastercard rates level-lll

Sample interchange rates for the same credit card transaction; Failing to follow rules results in costly extra fees.

Countertop terminals like the popular First Data FD Series, Verifone VX series, or Ingenico iCT series, with downloaded programming, cannot support level III. The US EMV ecosystem requires a web-based payment gateway with EMV terminal and level III retail certification. For example, CenPOS has certified the Verifone MX915 to First Data, Chase Paymentech and Tsys, the latter which enables use with most processors. Merchants can use CenPOS via a web browser virtually instantly or an integrated application.

EMV COMPLIANCE DATES

While EMV is not a mandate, effective October 1, the party that does not support EMV (short for Europay, MasterCard, Visa) chip card acceptance is liable for counterfeit card, and sometimes lost or stolen card transactions. Because card issuers previously absorbed most of these losses without any notification to the merchant, businesses can expect losses if action is not taken. Additionally, non-EMV compliance fees have already been announced with at least one provider, NPC, implementing them starting January 1, 2016.

CARD NOT PRESENT

Many distributors primarily accept payments via other methods, including card not present (CNP) credit card. With CNP fraud already climbing for wholesalers, it’s only going to get worse. Implementing 3-D Secure (Vbyv / Verified by Visa and others) shifts some fraud liability from the merchant to the issuer. This service is available only via certain gateways and can only be used when the customer pays online via a shopping cart, einvoice, or paypage. Distributors may need to change their payment methods to maximize protection against fraud.

RECOMMENDATION

Wholesale distributors need to partner with a payments expert to mitigate risk as well as manage interchange rate qualification. Selecting vendors based on new criteria can increase profits virtually overnight.

Christine Speedy, CenPOS global sales and integrated solutions reseller, 954-942-0483. CenPOS is a merchant-centric, end-to-end payments engine that drives enterprise-class solutions for businesses, saving them time and money, while improving their customer engagement. CenPOS? secure, cloud-based solution optimizes acceptance for all payment types across multiple channels without disrupting the merchant?s banking relationships.