A payment gateway serves as the middleman between you and your customer. It authenticates, encrypts, and transmits transaction details to your payment processor. The processor then relays the transaction status — approved or denied — to your business and its customers. Before you choose a payment gateway provider, make sure they maintain PCI compliance (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard). This ensures your transactions remain secure.
Real-time processing
A merchant’s payment gateway is a service that allows money to move from your customer’s bank account into your merchant account. It acts like a bridge, but instead of bringing funds directly from the bank to the merchant account, it first verifies your customer’s information and then sends the transaction data to the card networks to be verified. This takes place in real-time, which means that you can process payments in a fast and secure way. Real-time processing enables businesses to decide and act on the freshest available data. This helps to ensure a better customer experience, automate processes, detect anomalies, and improve operational efficiency. In addition, real-time processing can help with fraud detection, supply chain and logistics operations, real-time analytics for marketing, and more. When shopping for a payment gateway, consider how flexible it will be to meet the needs of your customers and the specifics of your business. This includes accepting various credit cards and mobile options and ensuring all these methods are secure.
Multi-currency conversion
Whether your customers shop online or in person, their purchases must be processed using a payment gateway. These services verify that payment is legitimate, whether made with a credit card, a digital wallet, or a local payment. In-person point-of-sale systems look at the chip inside a customer’s credit card to confirm that the payment is legitimate, but online, it’s the payment gateway’s job to do so. Once customers have chosen their products/services and entered their billing information on your site, the system redirects them to the gateway, which securely passes this data via encrypted channels. The payment gateway then sends this information to the payment processor, which forwards it to the card-issuing bank. The card-issuing bank checks the transaction details. It approves or declines it based on several factors, including fraud detection procedures (e.g., geolocation, velocity pattern analysis, OFAC list lookups, ‘deny-list’ lookups, delivery address verification, computer finger printing technology, and identity morphing detection). The acquiring bank then deposits the funds into the merchant’s account. This process usually takes about three days. The gateway calculates taxes in real-time and uses various tools to screen for fraudulent transactions, including AVS, CVV2, and DVS verification. A new Multi-Currency Conversion window is available to help you manage these conversion processes. Conversion setting changes are reflected in this window’s Header and line-level regions.
Fraud protection
A payment gateway is a secure channel that connects a customer’s bank account to the merchant’s business account. It collects and encrypts customer payment information to ensure the security of sensitive data. It then sends that data to a merchant’s bank or payment processor for verification. If the payment is approved, it’s then sent to the business bank account. When selecting a payment gateway, look for one that offers multiple fraud protection tools. These include geolocation, velocity pattern analysis, OFAC list lookups, ‘deny-list’ lookups, delivery address verification, computer fingerprinting technology, and identity morphing detection. These can help to reduce fraudulent transactions and protect the merchant from financial loss. It is also essential that the payment gateway can detect malware and prevent it from accessing the customer’s personal or payment information. The payment gateway should use multiple prevention methods, such as a firewall, anti-virus software, and SSL encryption. Choosing the right payment gateway for your online business can impact how you process payments, the currencies you can accept, transaction fees, and the payment methods you offer. The key is choosing a solution that suits your customers’ and business needs. An excellent way to do this is to work with a payment provider that follows secure coding procedures and maintains PCI compliance.
Customer service
Providing excellent customer service isn’t just good for your brand image. It also helps you boost sales. Customers often report that they’re willing to pay more for a better experience, so creating great experiences at every point of contact makes financial sense for you, too. While it’s a good idea to have general customer service protocols in place for your team, there may be times when the situation calls for stepping outside of those guidelines to help your customer. A good payment gateway supports your efforts to deliver exceptional customer service by allowing you to customize your transaction process, including payment methods and terms and conditions. In addition to offering an extensive list of payment methods, many gateways offer tiered pricing plans that allow businesses with varying monthly sales volumes to pay a flat monthly fee or higher transaction fees without incurring a monthly minimum. A reputable gateway will secure all transactions through encryption and other methods to secure financial information. Many gateways support recurring payments, ideal for businesses that regularly sell memberships or subscription products or auto-ship their goods. Some of the best gateways allow you to customize recurring payment options, while others include a “set it and forget it” recurring billing model. Some gateways also support multiple merchant accounts, a standard feature for high-risk businesses that have been denied a merchant account by an acquiring bank or have a history of fraud.
