UNDERSTANDING THE POSITOUCH CREDIT CARD PROCESS By Diana Dumitru with Ed Wood

The route your money takes to get to your bank account can be complicated and difficult to understand.  In this article I am going to explain the process and then provide you with some tips which could save you money in the process. 

How Credit Cards Affect Your Cash Flow

The first step in a Point of Sale payment transaction involves processing credit card sales through the software interface program (that is, Slipstream or Transaction +). A batch is created each day to track individual transactions, and at the end of the day, the batch is settled. The settlement of the batch starts the journey your money makes from your office to your bank account.  First the batch of transactions goes to your selected processor, then the approvals you have taken throughout the day are settled with them, once the authorizations are cleared by the processor the money goes on to your merchant company. Your merchant company can be a bank or other financial institution you have set up your accounts for your Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, Diners or JCB, or any other credit card type you might be using.

American Express transactions have two options available to you:

Option 1: Processing your American Express transactions directly through American Express.  The drawback to this is American Express processing uses only a dial up connection for smaller merchants, (also referred to as split dial connection.   This slows down the Authorization and Settlement process costing you valuable time.  

Option 2: If you are currently using a high speed internet connection, (i.e. DSL or Cable), POSitouch interfaces with a variety of processors who can process your American Express cards as high speed credit cards, (they may charge an extra fee for this service).

Speaking of High Speed Credit Cards….

Did you know you can save enough money on your credit card sales to pay for your High Speed Internet Connection? 

With the advent of high speed internet you now have a new option available to you and processors want to push you towards it, “High Speed” credit card processing.  This form of processing not only can save you money it will help you improve speed of service in your restaurant by speeding up the amount of time it takes to authorize a credit card purchase.

• Mercury Payment Systems (www…)
• Vital (www…)
• Paymentech (www…)
• FDMS North (www…)
• FDMS South (www…)

By making wise choices in the way you process your credit cards you can save money.  The different processors out there who were all vying for your business and offering you discounted rates to move to them, by making these moves you could see a difference of 1 to 2 % in what the processor charges you to take credit cards at your business.  These processors will give even deeper discounts to you to move to high speed connections.  Once you have made the move to high speed internet you will begin to see the world of the Internet open up to you, search for the products you serve, set up your own web page to advertise to customers, even set up alliances with web-based ordering systems such as www.bigholler.com which will take orders over the internet and print them up in your restaurant for your delivery service.

Save your manager time and keep him on the floor where he can make you more profits by setting up a high speed connection to allow him to do his ordering of supplies.  Contact your Account Manager and see about IControl reporting which will allow you at a glance to see sales figures for a day, week, month, or any period you wish.

As you can see your Credit cards while at times cost you on the bottom line they can also save you enough to pay for a valuable tool if you choose wisely and research the deals out there available to you. 

Please feel free to contact your account manager if you have questions on how you can save and make more money by moving to high speed credit cards.