Merchant Accounts (Credit Card Processing)

For the past several months I have been searching for decent Merchant Account options for credit card processing of North American Sales.
I have been to ICBC, Citibank, Cathay, and Taishin. All of the above only offer cc processing in NTD, which is a shame. Anyway I had applied with Cathay however they denied the application as we don’t do alot direct advertising in our markets (most sales comming from word of mouth). After that I found out from Citibank that Taiwan law requires that for any merhant account 80% of cc transactions must take place on island! I have also searched the net for offshore merchant accounts however fees start at 6% not to mention the high start up fees.

Has anyone found a better solution?

Until then my fustration with Taiwan finance laws continue. ECCT and Amcham Taipei, where are you on this issue?

Try www.freepay.com.tw

:sunglasses:

2checkout.com

Freepay and 2checkout are both e-commerce sites hence they don’t offer true card processing. One sets up a web catalog and customers have to order through the website. This works if you have SKUs and part numbers but not if you have custom pieces, which is the case for us.

Also, if I remeber correctly 2checkout is above 5.5% per transaction. That is rather expensive.

www.worldpay.com accepts companies based in Taiwan.

If approved, you get a true merchant account for VISA and Mastercard. Their payment gatewy can easily be integrated into you shop. However, payment is delayed by one month as a protection against chargebacks and you’ll have a monthly fee + transaction costs.

[quote=“ematheww”]Freepay and 2checkout are both e-commerce sites hence they don’t offer true card processing. One sets up a web catalog and customers have to order through the website. This works if you have SKUs and part numbers but not if you have custom pieces, which is the case for us.

Also, if I remeber correctly 2checkout is above 5.5% per transaction. That is rather expensive.[/quote]

I don’t know anything about Freepay so can’t say anything about them.

Yes, 2CO is a third party processor, and it’s “high” at 5.5% but considering how easy sign up (cheap) and set up of the cart were, I didn’t mind paying 2% more than my next option which at the time was a PITA to apply for.

And 2CO can be used for custom orders. (Unless something’s changed recently that I’m unaware of. I just know that I’ve billed electronically for different amounts for custom orders.) If you don’t like the 2CO cart, you can use another cart but just process the payments through 2CO. And although 2CO is really the ‘vendor’ as a third-party processor, your customer’s credit card statement does have your company/website name appear so it’s not as confusing as it used to be. Finally, you can get your money deposited into your account on a weekly basis. It used to be semi-monthly, and other companies make you wait a month.

Again, depends on how quickly you want to be up and running and able to take cards. Haven’t looked recently but I remember being able to take all major cards.

I have received quotes from World pay they charge 5.5 to 6.0 % plus about $300 a year in fees.

Freepay has gone bust! They no longer offer credit card services.

I am curious if anyone has had any experience with Greenworld (lujie) or SunTech (hongyang). I currently have applications with both companies. Quite frankly I want to go with the one which is less likely to end up like Freepay.

I am not sure anyone is still monitoring this forum, however I thought it important to update:
We finally bit the bullet and decided to go with Greenworld www.greenworld.com.tw On the Taiwan forms they seem to have the best reputation.

The application for a foreign owned company like ours was suprisingly easy. The only item they required besides the standard (company license, ID, etc…) was my Taiwan credit report from JCIC near the train station. While it required a trip to Taipei this was quite easy and painless. So I am quite happy that we made it to this stage. Now let’s see how they perform.

Terms are decent 2.8% Yearly fee 10500NTD and a deposit of 30000NTD This also provides us with an online terminal so we can accept payments anywhere in the world (however they have to be charged in NTD)

If anyone has found something else I would be curious to know.