Processing card payments taken online, offline...

[russell king]

Hi all

We are having loads of issues with our current PSP/Merchant account providers - ease of use, lack of Maestro, Amex support, reliability, poor customer service, costs, pre-authorisation woes, you get the idea....!!. Basically we want to drop them.

Our idea was to drop our current PSP/Merchant account and upgrade our PayPal website payments service to PayPal Pro. We wouldn't process the cards online through this service (as Actinic doesn't support it) but could capture details then use the PayPal Pro virtual terminal to enter card details offline. Now I know a lot of you aren't convinced by offering the PayPal payment option - but it works very well for us - so I don't want to get into that argument in this thread

We take a fair percentage of payments via PayPal (at least 30%) and were ideally wanting to move to the new PayPal Website Payments Pro service, so we could take PayPal and credit/debit cards through a single service.
However it appears PayPal Pro may never be supported by Actinic 7 (or 8?) so I was wondering if the following setup would be feasible...

We offer 3 payment options at checkout ,
1. Online via credit/debit cards
2. Offline via phone
3. PayPal

If customer selects online via credit/debit cards then we securely take their details online and process them offline (we would use the virtual terminal in PayPal website payments pro). We would also use the virtual terminal for offline payments taken over phone.
For payments via PayPal the customer is directed off to PayPal site and pays via their account.

We currently use a PSP and don't capture/store/download any card details in actinic v7. Is this easy to do? Do any of you out there do this already?
I know we would obviously need to get an SSL certificate so that the card entry page was https, but are there any othere issues that we need to be aware of here?

Thanks

[RuralWeb]

We wouldn't process the cards online through this service (as Actinic doesn't support it)

Yes it does - or am I missing the point of what you are saying

[Duncan Rounding]

Yes it does - or am I missing the point of what you are saying

I believe that Russell is referring to PayPal Pro, not Paypal Standard.

The solution here is the same as Malcolm and I were discussing in another thread that you should be able to (as Paypal's UK website 'sort of' says) have a Paypal VT with the Standard account (ie not only with Paypal Pro) with a monthly charge.

[russell king]

Malcom

Duncan is right, Actinic only supports standard PayPal, not Pro. For some reason however Actinic Express DOES support PayPal Pro but thats a whole different thread (see my other recent post)

Duncan, do you know if you can get a Virtual Terminal from PayPal without upgrading to Pro?

Also, as per my original post, capturing credit card details in the Actinic checkout and processing offline, is this as easy as just getting an SSL certificate and changing some settings in Actinic?

[Duncan Rounding]

Duncan, do you know if you can get a Virtual Terminal from PayPal without upgrading to Pro?

Malcolm has emailed Paypal regarding this - it does say you can have it with either Standarrd or Pro on the website but when you try to signup it says Pro - so some confusion.

Also, as per my original post, capturing credit card details in the Actinic checkout and processing offline, is this as easy as just getting an SSL certificate and changing some settings in Actinic?

Yes.

[RuralWeb]

Actinic only supports standard PayPal, not Pro

True but as I said in another thread I can see no difference between the two as far as actinic goes - they both process the cards into the same account and both can have a virtual terminal.

So unless I am completely stupid whats the problem.

[RuralWeb]

Malcolm has emailed Paypal regarding this

Ok I now have a paypal pro account with virtual terminal and it works with actinic.

No problems

[RuralWeb]

The paypal pro VT is pretty basic but seems to do the job ok.

[russell king]

True but as I said in another thread I can see no difference between the two as far as actinic goes - they both process the cards into the same account and both can have a virtual terminal.

So unless I am completely stupid whats the problem.

Malcom

The problem with std PayPal is the fact that the customer gets taken over to the PayPal branded pages to enter their payment details, with Pro there's an API interface and its done in the background leaving the customer on your site.

Basically its all down to appearance and professionalism - some users still drop out when they see they are getting taken elsewhere to add card details. I guess they assume if you aren't 'big' enough to handle cards yourself then you might be a bit dodgy. I'm sure many in this forum also have customers drop out at this stage...

You say you now have a PayPal Pro account with VT - but i presume this is now co$ting you £20 ish a month?

Also, any recommendations as to who to get a good value SSL certificate from?

Cheers

[wjcampbe]

if you aren't 'big' enough to handle cards yourself then you might be a bit dodgy.

I read current customer thinking as the exact opposite of this - "Too small to afford professional processing - how likely is this lot to keep my details secure?"

[russell king]

I read current customer thinking as the exact opposite of this - "Too small to afford professional processing - how likely is this lot to keep my details secure?"

Bill

Personally, I disagree. I always think that companies who appear to securely (with SSL) handle the credit card details capturing process on their own site come across as more trustworthy, larger and professional than those that redirect you to a PSP page branded by Protx, WorldPay, SecPay, PayPal, HSBC etc...

I think it would make a good subject for debate, maybe we should start a new thread on this topic and see what the Actinic community think..

Or maybe we should run a poll, see which method generates the most 'drop outs' at payment stage - using a PSP (redirecting then coming back) or capturing details on your own site (with SSL) and processing offline.

Mmm, could be a useful exercise I think....

[RuralWeb]

always think that companies who appear to securely (with SSL) handle the credit card details capturing process on their own site come across as more trustworthy

I disagree and support bills post - psps are the way ahead IMO and shoppers are now beginning to realise that the sites which "appear to securely handle payments on thier own site" are infact the ones to avoid as thier card details are downloaded onto what is usually an insecure pc to which every tom dick and harry has access. With a psp the site owner never has access to the card details.

[RuralWeb]

with Pro there's an API interface and its done in the background leaving the customer on your site.

Yes I know this but IMO the way it works is ok with me and all the site owners I have that use paypal - they all want people to know that they use Paypal not hide it from potential customers who are now actively seeking out websites that use paypal. I have only seen an increase in sales when paypal is added to a website never abandoned baskets or poor comments.

[russell king]

Bill, Malcom

I'll conceed to your greater experience here. I currently use standard paypal payments for c/cards and get a fair amount of dropouts. That said I have no idea what the average drop out is (regardless of payment method) so couldn't say if it was down to dislike or mistrust of PayPal, or just that 1 in 6 internet shoppers drop out at this stage regardless...

Maybe i should just drop my PSP and just use std PayPal payments for both cards and PayPal accounts. (wpuld save me £25 standing charge a month) I was just thinking that redirecting to a PayPal branded site when you actually wanted to pay by credit card may confuse some customers or put them off?

Anyway as said before it would be nice to run a poll thread to see what is actually occuring with these two scenarios - what do you think?

[Big_Dave]

My customers seem to like being taken to a Worldpay page, as I do. Worldpay is known to alot of people and of course backed by a major bank that puts branding all over the payment page to add more clout. It all looks secure and professional and its nice to know the employees of the website do not have access to your details.

Personally I do not like websites to process my payment offline. I always imagine an employee with this huge list of credit card details in his or her hand. Not very secure. Once you hand your card details to your local garage, shop or a website, then this is where the security is likely to be breached.

I also like to be taken (as many Ebayers do) to Paypals own website for payment. Again my customers seem to like it too. They are used to it from their Ebay deals.

Personally if a site has Paypal only I consider them maybe too small to have invested in payment processing with one of the big guys (Worldpay, Protx etc).

Just my humble opinion. Happy holidays everyone.