A word to the wise when selecting a POS system and incorporating their credit card processing module. You should ask your sales rep (and get in writing)… What would you have to do to switch your credit card processing company in the furture and how much will it cost? Many POS companies that are also involved in merchant processing will make it extremely difficult (and costly) to switch processors. In fact, some charge as much as $1,395 to change your processing company. You should take this in consideration when determing your cost of ownership. Your right or ability to shop for the best processing solution should not be dictated by your POS vendor. Always honor and abide by your agreement with the vendor, but just make sure that you reserve the right to shop for a more cost effective solution. Good luck.
We were able to use Heartland from day one on our POS (Prism) No issues.
Bodegahwy,
I think that you missed the point. The point was to stress the importance that you (the merchant) would have the ability to switch your credit card processing company on your POS system after the fact. So what would you have to do to switch companies and what would it cost you.
This is something that you should know when selecting your POS system. Good luck!
Prism does charge a fee to switch credit card processors. It’s not close to the $1400 referenced above but I think it is closer to the $200 range.
paul7979,
A $200 fee to switch your processing is a fair fee to pay. However, as my post states, there are companies that will charge up to $1,400. I know this first hand, however, it would not be fair to them to post their names.
As the post suggests, people should inquire so that they are well aware of this when shopping for a POS system.
Thank you for your comments.
Take care.
We have been using “Point Of Success” for several months now, it comes bundled with Chargepath for Merc Payment systems, I believe to use another processor simply requires a different chargepath module for a few hundred dollars.
We have been very happy with Mercury, So I do not see any changes happening in the future.
GotRocks,
I believe that it would be helpful to the readers to know what “a few hundred dollars” would be. Usually, you have parameter change fees, possible software upgrade fees, change of platform fees, time and travel fees (if necessary) and other fees.
If you could find this out and post it, that would be helpful information to have.
Thank you for your comments.
4 posts about companies you refuse to name that you know charge $1400 to change and then you suggest the above poster should be providing more details when he says he believes his provider did not screw him over. Me thinks thou doest protest too much and it harms your credibility.
Rick G,
My motivation for writing this post was driven by merchants that contacted me to say that their respective POS vendor was charging them this price or that price to switch their processing parameters. What I also learned from these customers was that they didn’t think about asking this question up front when they were researching their POS system purchase.
The people that have commented or replied to my post and have shared their experiences… provide other business owners some valuable information.
My intent is not to disparage any POS company or vendor for that matter and I am not endorsing any POS vendor on my post. A company or vendor has the right to price their product or service as they see fit. I simply suggested that a merchant researching a POS system… should ask the question.
Thank you for your comment.
Fair enough Tcolon, here ya go.
Copied from; http://www.pointofsuccess.com/prices.htm
Chargepath for PCCharge
When using PCCharge Payment Server for credit card processing, this software is required to connect Point of Success with PCCharge Payment Server. $299.
Requires the separate purchase of a single-computer license of PCCharge Payment Server software version 5.9.1 through 5.9.3.
Chargepath for PCCharge replaces our former PCCharge Connector software. Upgrades to Chargepath for PCCharge are available for $100 for PCCharge Connector software purchased prior to January 1, 2010. Upgrades for PCCharge Connector purchased after this date are available at no charge.
Chargepath is recognized as a Validated Payment Application by the PCI Security Standards Council.
We started out with an El-Cheapo cash register, and taking no plastic at all. As our business grew, I got set-up with “Square” so we could take plastic at the store, and especially for our off-premise catered events, then business got even bigger, I put together the POS hardware and chose Point Of Success for our software, yet we still used square and printed receipts through one of our etehenet printers, this helped for our many customers who had no cellular phones and e-mail was way above their ability.
Then our business really started rocking, and I brought on another cash drawer for multiple cashiers on one POS terminal, and reconciling CC charges between square and the POS got increasingly more difficult and I started seeing card mistakes including a few over-charges.
Since Square makes it impossible to do a partial refund, or any refund at all without the cardholder present, I looked into Mercury since it is already embedded in our POS software. We have been happy since we started with Mercury, and even got an initial batch of their gift cards.
A quick phone call to mercury, a pile of paperwork, and a quick call to Inborne and everything was
Plus due to our volume, the processing fee’s are spectacular through Mercury IMO.
I do not suggest Square for a busy place, they had to change customer agreements where a personal SSN is now needed to have an account. Your FEIN in no longer acceptable to them. I do not know why they changed this, but I have my suspicions. I refuse to cross my corporate ID (S-Corp) numbers and my Personal SSN at all costs. If an explanation is needed on that, I’ll be glad to share, But I am sure you can figure out the reasons easily enough.
Hey GotRocks,
Thank you for sharing your POS / processing experience with me / us. FYI… if you still need a mobile payment device, you might want to look at Pay AnyWhere (PA) www.payanywhere.com. PA allows for simple refunds (partial or whole) and allows a business to use their EIN # to set up the account.
In the interest of full disclosure, I work for Capital for Merchants which is a wholly owned subsidiary of North American Bancard and also owns Pay AnyWhere.
Cheers!
No. YOU missed the point. Prism does not sell a bundled service that is hard to get away from. Heartland is not affiliated with them. My point was simply that there was no issue with Prism as far as using another processor.
Also, I no fairness issue at all in identifying the companies that charge excessive fees. As long as the fees reported are factual it is simply good information.
and last… Thanks for coming out with your affiliation. It did seems to me like you have a dog in this fight.
YEP!
bodegahwy,
I don’t see why you are turning my advice to readers into a hostile situation. I will not post on this or any other website any information that could hurt another company especially when it comes to their pricing. We are all adults on this site and I trust that we are all wise consumers that are more than capable of asking a vendor a discovery question when researching any product or service.
As far as me having “a dog in this fight” is concern… please look through all of my postings and see if I ever tried to sell my merchant cash advance products… the answer is no. The only reason that I mention one of the 8 companies that our parent company owns, was because GotRocks mentioned a particular problem that he / she had with another product.
So see, my affiliation disclosure was required in that scenario so that I would maintain my integrity and I believe that I owe that to the readers. So frankly, your attack on my intentions or integrity are really unwarranted and improper. Perhaps we could move on to other issues since we have managed to take a simple piece of advice and completely turned it into a hostile topic.
Perhaps you could tell us what you do and post something positive that could help all of us.
Thanks.