Actinic Payments vs Protx

[vistamaster]

We all can find a lot of advantages about using Actinic Payments or Protx from their websites, salesmen, and other marketing stuff, but in reality things are slightly different So let's talk!

To those of you using PROTX my question would be: what are the main disadvantages having Protx as your PSP (e.g genuine cards often declined, a lot of charge backs, etc. etc.) ?

To those of you using Actinic Payments: again - disadvantages please, I noticed monthly cost is half the PROTX price (which is very atracting), but what about reliability, security, and transaction costs or maybe there is something hidden inside?

Let's compare those two providers, this will help me (and hopefully others) make up our mind on choosing one of them as our Payment Service Provider

[TraceyHand]

Ok. Firstly, I'm assuming the Small/Med Business Package for now

Protx
Set up fee: £0
Monthly charge: £20+VAT
Transactions: up to 1000 per quarter

Actinic Payments
Set up fee: £50
Monthly Charge: £20+Vat
Transactions: up to 350 per month

Now, I've used Protx for years and, back in February/March time, added Actinic Payments.
It's worthy to note that I still run BOTH.

Based on my experience of the service.

There are an equal number of 'drop outs' (ie orders without payments) from both Protx AND Actinic Payments where, for one reason or another, a customer does not (and, on occasional, is unable to) proceed from the store to the PSP or bails out at the payment page.

I had hoped that switching from Protx (which has always suffered this a fair bit) to Actinic Payments would help in this area. In all honesty, it hasn't and I still get a LOT of customers who make numerous attempts to get TO the payment pages.

Protx can send both the customer AND the merchant an email confirming the payment and giving details of the customer/transaction.
The merchant email also shows any fraud/risk assessment results.
The customer email, however, is lacking in detail as it does not detail the order itself.

Actinic Payments sends NO EMAILS at all. Not to the customer OR merchant.
Now, as a V9 user, that lack of merchant email is somewhat less of an issue as all successful (and possibly unsuccessful) Actinic Payments transactions are detailed (address/CV2/3d secure etc) within the downloaded order.
In V8, you have/had to log into your admin panel online to view this information but I suspect very few people using Actinic Payments are on V8.

On that note: Actinic Payments BIG plus is its tight integration with Actinic itself.
Not only can you process payments for offline orders directly FROM Actinic (it transfers you to a kind of virtual terminal server for the actual payment itself) but you can also void, refund and repeat existing Actinic Payments orders from within Actinic.

This, IMO, is the main USP for Actinic Payments and I would choose it over Protx for that reason.
Not only does it mean that, if you are taking an order from a customer 'live', you do not need to record their details or log in elsewhere to process the payment, but it also means that you save time when refunding/voiding/adding to orders and repeating payments etc.

As I said, just my opinion and experience but I figured it was worth sharing

[Darren B]

I am happy with AP, PROTX settlement issues seems to be a regular problem, always a reason for them being late but never there fault.

But as tracey has mentioned, i miss my email confirmation. I want to be able to check them.

AP also has the ability to customise the payment page, albeit still a bit limited but its getting better. Attached an image to show what can be done.

I have had customers complain they cant place orders, but this is normally because the card has been rejected and the response is failed address or 3d secure or something. So hardly ap's fault, generally im happy with it just needs tweaking in certain areas

D

[TraceyHand]

good thinking, D
I knew I'd forget something!
(that also reminds me I need to re-design mine post-upgrade )

[Darren B]

And it reminds me as well, if you do then you need to host the custom files on a secure server somewhere. If not then your customers will get a SSL warning when on the payment page.

[malbro]

We all can find a lot of advantages about using Actinic Payments or Protx from their websites, salesmen, and other marketing stuff, but in reality things are slightly different So let's talk!

I chose AP over Protx as there seemed little advantage in using Protx and AP is better integrated. No problems with AP and settlement through Streamline is always very quick. So far, touch wood, there have been no problems on V8.5.3

[RuralWeb]

Don't forget that with protx you need to reconfigure the payment scripts every time that you upgrade your actinic version and what a performance that can be!

One advantage protx has at the moment is the third man but I hear that that is to be added to ap. When that happens protx will be dead in the water

[cbarling]

Just for information, there are a number of ongoing developments of Actinic Payments. These should see the light of day over the next few months.

They include confirmation emails, hosting of CSS and images in a secure area provided by Actinic and free integrated fraud checking. The latter should have a higher level of integration than any other solution. We are also ensuring that 3D Secure for Maestro can be implemented independent of turning it on for other cards. Watch this space.

Chris

[Darren B]

Don't forget that with protx you need to reconfigure the payment scripts every time that you upgrade your actinic version and what a performance that can be!r

Yep and i have not had to make any changes to AP for the v9.0.3 upgrade scenario

[pinbrook]

Also we know that Protx groaned alot dealing with increased transactions in the run up to christmas `last year or the year before.

We don't know how AP will cope as its the first Xmas for it, but we also have to consider that xmas sales will probably be down somewhat this year anyway.

however given the choice i'd go for AP.

[Darren B]

Don't forget that with protx you need to reconfigure the payment scripts every time that you upgrade your actinic version and what a performance that can be!

Oooh 9.0.3 upgrade actually did not effect protx, it is all working fine

Also we know that Protx groaned alot dealing with increased transactions in the run up to christmas `last year or the year before.

Funny PROTX was no problems for me last year, i had no more fall out than usual, i still have it in place incase AP melts down but i actually dont see there being a problem, creditcall seem to be better positioned to handle it. But we will see

[JGLIGHTING]

I am looking to use PSP on our site.

At the moment we are looking to use Protx. Due to Protx can hold the card detail longer then AP. You have three option with Protex depending how long you want to hold the cards details.

Don't quote me on this I might be wrong....

A lot our products we sell some times take a while to get in and we don't like taking payment until we ship the products.

[guccij]

Yep and i have not had to make any changes to AP for the v9.0.3 upgrade scenario

I didn't have to change anything when upgrading to 9.03 and we use Protx.

We've found Protx to be pretty efficient and can't recall a problem. It is our second string PSP - HSBC is our first.

I would like to use AP for offline order taking for the same reason Tracey likes it above. We wouldn't use AP for all transactions though as it is more expensive than our current arrangements.

However, on querying with HSBC if they could associate my merchant number with AP, they didn't know what I was talking about and I gave up. Actinic sales weren't able to help either.

For the moment then, we are entering all offline orders into the MOTO form in Actinic and not saving the info until the order has been processed using HSBC so the cc details are not held in any physical form by us whatsoever.

[brian.mc]

Don't forget that with protx you need to reconfigure the payment scripts every time that you upgrade your actinic version and what a performance that can be!

One advantage protx has at the moment is the third man but I hear that that is to be added to ap. When that happens protx will be dead in the water

I've never had any problem with this. Actinic backs up your Protx Script as part of the upgrade process and all I've ever had to do is open the backup file and copy/paste my password and email address into the upgraded file.

As for 3rd Man, I find that the least useful part of Protx - the results can be very inconsistent.

[Darren B]

However, on querying with HSBC if they could associate my merchant number with AP, they didn't know what I was talking about and I gave up. Actinic sales weren't able to help either..

You would need to tell them its credit call not actinic payments, they wont recognise it otherwise and actinic should have told you this aswell