If anyone else is opening a small business, credit card processing deal

[LEANE30]

Very interesting - i'll be needing this in the future, right now i don't accept credit cards, checks only, unless i have to, then i default to paypal for the one-offs and eat teh 3%.

on the Intuit/QB topic, I actually just switched up from doing so much manual entry on 2008 to the new online, it's $30/month, but all account activity can be directly uploaded from my bank (WF) and the system automatically records entries that i tell it to recognize like recurring debits for say internet, etc. or credits for royalty payments, surcharge incomes, etc. it's a serious life-saver - pretty much eliminates a majority of the need to have an accountant

[bernzpeed]

I remember a little while back when I was posting details about my business, and other threads, a few of you were opening your own business as well.

My past experiences with credit card processing has only been slightly better than being on the receiving end of a prison shower gang rape. With all the hidden fees, equipment, setup fees, gateway fees, fee fucking fee after fee, then more fees to actually take a card which are always high.

At first I was just going to say screw it and be cash only, it would kind of work out in my situation but would still probably be somewhat of an inconvenience to customers. I stumbled across this yesterday and just had my app approved today and I'm ready to accept credit cards!

https://www.gopayment.com

It's run by intuit and they have a deal for new small businesses. I signed up for the higher traffic account to process more than $1k a month in cards, but it's still a pretty damn good deal. $13 a month, 1.7% a swipe, and 30 cents a swipe.

Another cool part is I can take cards on my ipod/iphone, right now they are shipping out the readers for free. You can also take cards on a computer as well, however if you want the 1.7% swipe rate (2.7 if you type it in) you will need a card reader, but those can be picked up for like $50.

FWIW taking cards on your computer is kind of tedious, if you are going to have a line of people waiting to ring out I wouldn't recommend it at all, it's not very efficient and there's a lot of clicking. But in my situation it will be just fine.

Just a heads up if anyone else is looking to do the same thing.

I use square.com. They sent me a free card reader no charge. I have the app on my android, iphone available too. check it out.