5 Answers to the Most Frequently Asked Questions about Payment Gateways

If you are a business with an online presence, you surely know how payment gateways can make it easy for you to receive payments from customers based anywhere in the world. This is a merchant service that acts as a virtual equivalent of a Point of Sale in a physical store. In simple words, without a payment gateway, your business wouldn’t run at all as this service allows the payment processing of debit and credit cards in the online world!

Luckily, with a payment gateway like PayTabs which is easy to integrate with your website or mobile app, you can expect fast and secure payments without any glitch. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have questions about payment gateways. So, here are 5 most asked questions with their answers:

1) How does a payment gateway function?

When your customer purchases a product online, a payment gateway like PayTabs contacts your store’s acquiring bank. This bank is the one that will receive payments. The acquiring bank in turn contacts the bank which has issued the customer’s credit card or debit card. If there is enough money on the customer’s card to pay for the purchased item, the issuing bank will allow the transaction. The payment gateway will then be able to gather the money from the issuing bank of the customer, and all of this will happen in seconds!

2) How much does a payment gateway charge?

The kind of fees you have to pay will vary from one payment gateway to another. This will usually cover your setup fees, monthly fees and qualified rate that is charged per transaction. Support and reporting fees might also be included. So, go with a reliable and affordable gateway like PayTabs and avoid hidden charges.

3) What is a merchant account and why do I need it?

If you wish to receive payments from customer’s debit or credit card for every purchase made, you definitely need a merchant account. It is a specialized bank account that carries the fund you receive from customers for a specific time period, before sending it to your traditional account. You need it because without a merchant account, you cannot process payments. A merchant account will work with the payment gateway to facilitate easy transactions, so that the gateway deposits all payments into this account.

4) How to choose a payment gateway?

Though there are many payment gateways available these days, not all can be trusted equally. But with PayTabs, you will get all that your business needs with ease. This gateway is highly secure, and lets you accept payments in 168 currencies. Plus, merchants can use it even if they don’t have websites. PayTabs also provide regular financial reports and lets you maintain all customers and transactions from a single dashboard. This can help immensely when it comes to keeping a tab on the progress of your business.

5) Is the payment gateway secure enough?

A payment gateway must be very secure since it stores and transfers a lot of customer details and online frauds and identity thefts are very common these days. So, choosing a gateway that complies with PCI DSS requirements is ideal. It should feature advanced tools like intrusion detection, firewalls, and secure credit card data storage to avoid the risk of frauds. PCI DSS is also known as Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, and it ensures that all businesses store, process and accept card information in a very secure manner. So, choose a gateway like PayTabs, and rest assured that you have minimized the risk of frauds almost completely.

Now that you know what a payment gateway is essentially all about, choose the right one and make your business a huge success!