credit card terminals

[gloria jean]

we are a small business and wish to start accepting credit card payments - which terinal supplier and services do you find are the best and least expensive

[Markandshez]

Whatever you do shop around - the chances are your usual business bank will be very expensive. At the moment Barclaycard are quite cheap as are streamline. Be careful when signing up as they will try and sign you up for four years - and you will be paying four years charges even if the business stops trading. We have also caught the saleperson putting us down as a sole trader instead of a Limited company for the same reason.

We use them both, streamline are easier to deal with at the start and tend to be less inclined to stitch you up, but Streamline are better at sorting problems out

[eastern]

I fully agree with previous answer, Streamline are the best by far. The main thing to do when setting up the account is haggle long and hard over their charges you should be paying less than 2% for credit cards and 0.20p for switch/maestro. The main thing with C/Card companies that you MUST be aware of is you have absolutely no come back of Card Holder Not Present. This is very important, if you let a dodgy transaction go through the money will be charged back out of your account when it is discovered and you have not got a leg to stand on. This happened to me and it hurt, no goods no money and no way of getting either back. And believe me the shiesters who pull of these frauds are very plausible, if I was ever in doubt on a high value sale I would ask them to fax me a copy of their credit card statement showing their full name and address that the card was reg to. This generally caught the fraudsters off guard and you never hear from them again. Hope this helps

[MikeCC]

I totally agree with the security measures already mentioned, it is also a good idea to get a signed order form if dealing in mail order, in case the person tries to claw back funds stating they never ordered them.

The Federation of Small Businesses offer a really great deal on both charges and rental of terminal