Ecommerce online payment gateway: Which one? What's the advantage of using a 3rd party API over just the bank?

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  whooah1979 on 21/04/2019 - 08:51

  +2

  The world trusts Paypal.

  • 

    brokenglish on 21/04/2019 - 12:24

    +1

    Buyers do, sellers enemy sometimes…

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  John Kimble on 21/04/2019 - 09:37

  +2

  refund <> chargeback

  https://www.noraawards.com.au/

  • 

    brokenglish on 21/04/2019 - 11:52

    I did not know this, very useful!

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  brokenglish on 21/04/2019 - 12:01

  +1

  Which bank has the best online merchant deal and reputation?

  Differ for every individual, you need to have a figure first so they can offer you something, only problem is it takes a while to setup, you need to go to the bank, discuss, etc., wait a couple days for them to setup. Can't go wrong with the Big 4.

  Which 3rd party payment gateway APIs would you consider?

  I have used PayPal, Stripe, and eWAY.
  - With Stripe you can sign up and start accepting payment on day 1. Problem is it could be a nightmare for accounting. The amount they transfer to your bank is the amount minus their fee. Only if you need to match every transaction though.
  - eWAY transfers money as-is as they come and only charges their fee to you at the end of a month like a bill.
  - PayPal…ugh, it's buyer's favourite but seller's nightmare sometimes. They can just randomly hold your money saying you need to verify your business. It can take days to weeks for the money to clear. It is a problem if you need the cashflow to operate. A lot of buyers have and trust PayPal.

  There is no reason for you to only choose one. I have all 3 still active. It's free to setup, they only charge you for accepting payment.

  Why go for a 3rd party API?

  No reason, find one with the best rate while having a reasonably easy to setup API if you're going DIY

  Have you had any issues with chargebacks? For instance, if the customer wanted a refund, I find that the gateway providers are charging $25 for a chargeback.

  Refund from seller and force chargeback by the bank are different.
  Stripe/PayPal/eWAY doesn't charge you to process refund. But the surcharge for taking the original payment is not refunded to the seller.
  Never had been chargedback before.

  Would you include the payment surcharge within the cost of the total transaction, or add it on top of the price of the product?

  Different for every business and what you're selling, but I put everything in the cost of the product. Adding surcharge on top of the total during checkout looks very cheapskate to me. Good example is MSY but it's because they want to keep cost low if people want to pay cash or EFT.

  • 

    Falconjack on 21/04/2019 - 20:35

    Thanks for taking the time to provide such valuable insight! Esp about the refund/ chargeback - it's put my mind at ease a bit.