Average Fees to Accept Credit Cards on an E-Commerce Site

Merchants who are seeking to set up a merchant account on the Internet should consider the average fees that are required to accept credit cards online. The fees will vary depending on the type of merchant account provider that a merchant chooses. If a merchant...  

 

Merchants who are seeking to set up a merchant account on the Internet should consider the average fees that are required to accept credit cards online. The fees will vary depending on the type of merchant account provider that a merchant chooses. If a merchant decides to sign an agreement with an account provider known for offering stable and secure transactions, then he or she will likely pay extra fees for these quality services. Here is a listing of the average fees that providers charge for merchants to be able to accept credit cards on their e-commerce websites.

The Average Costs

When a merchant operates an e-commerce website, he or she can expect to pay about 2.3 to 2.5 percent in credit card transactional fees from a provider. The more established banks are the ones who will charge these fees. For other online payment processing companies without the renowned bank “name,” the fee may be very low. There may be online payment processing companies that only charge 0.2 to 0.5 percent in fees for one’s account. These online payment processing companies may also offer quality services. It is up to the merchant to do his or her research to see whether an online payment processing company has a clean record and is able to provide quality payment processing solutions.

Variable Factors

There are also variable factors to consider that may increase the charges that a merchant incurs for working with a particular payment processing company. If a merchant experiences a very high volume of transactions, then he or she may need to pay additional fees. There may also be gateway fees that a merchant must pay for using certain shopping cart software required for managing payments. One of the other factors that also causes fees to increase for e-commerce payments is the high occurrence of Internet fraud. There are a significant number of instances in which customers purchase products and make false “fraud” claims to credit card companies. This has also factored into the high fees that merchants incur in accepting payments online.

Debit Card Fees

An online merchant will be able to avoid some high fees by accepting debit cards. Debit cards tend to incur less fees for all entities involved in online transactions.

These are the average fees that a merchant can expect to pay on his or her e-commerce site. It pays to do one’s research and choose a quality merchant provider as a result.

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