Accept credit cards on your website – free merchant account

Are you planning on selling things on the internet? If so, you will probably also be thinking about how you can accept credit cards on your site. This article provides some basic information on adding credit card and other payment facilities to your websites.

Is it really necessary? Without a doubt! Internet purchases are often impulse buys. Cheques went out with the ark, nobody uses those any more. Credit card payment is a huge convenience if your customers are overseas. Some people – especially Americans – will not buy products from you unless you offer the credit card payment option.

The problem is that most of the merchant account providers want to charge you upfront to set up an account, then you must integrate their software into shopping carts and do lots of other techy stuff. It can be quite expensive and troublesome to arrange. Why do you think there are all those “e-commerce solutions” companies out there fleecing thousands off people? 

What you need is a nice simple system, fast to set up, simple copy and paste code and maybe some “Buy Now” buttons isn’t it? 

The answer is Paypal. Yes that US based outfit that eBayers use. Forget the “personal account” they offer, that has more conditions and limitations than you want to know about. To get straight to the good stuff you must open a PayPal Business or Premier account at first base. A personal account simply doesnt give you the options and flexibility you need. You need to be able to accept payments from from credit and debit cards, bank transfers (not to mention PayPal balances). Your customer does not have to have a PayPal account in order to pay you this way.

Best of all, you get “Buy Now” buttons, you can accept donations, subscription payments, have the ability to accept credit card payments via telephone, fax or in person (there is a nominal monthly fee for this option). There is no set up or monthly fees, and if you need one you can get a Free PayPal shopping cart and the ability to set up your own shopping cart, should you already have one.

Fees are about 1% above industry standard, but you get flexibility, no credit checks, no upfront fees, no usage or turnover limits. You can accept ALL cards, including ones like American Express, Diners and foreign cards that some merchant accounts won’t touch. Payments from a customers bank account? No problem. From a credit Paypal balance? No problem. Clients in South America, Russia or other places off the usual financial radar? No problem. 

Another nice factor is American buyers like Paypal, it’s an American company on US servers – they trust it! You can even set it up to charge them in dollars if you want to. (Try that with the Nat West.)

Best of all? You can sign up right now, for FREE, no waiting, no approvals, checks or other hoops to jump through like banks and merchants make you do. Be sure to create a PayPal Business or Premier account (it’s FREE), as a personal account is for hobby eBayers who only want to process a few transactions a year.

Go ahead, you have found your solution to accepting credit cards online already, you can be accepting credit cards in literally minutes – yes MINUTES! Click the banner below and go create a PayPal Business or Premier account.