Instabill Merchant Account Experts Blog

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Like a crazy roller coaster, the online payments industry is a constant ride of ups and downs. This year alone, merchants, payment service providers, and acquiring banks have all experienced many changes. Starting in 2011 and continuing into 2012, Visa audited a number of acquiring banks worldwide. Some of these banks lost their ability to process credit cards for certain high risk industries, while some banks lost entire merchant portfolios.

The following is a recap of what the audits entailed as well as how Instabill has kept up with the rules and regulations to ensure its merchants continue to process with uninterrupted services.

Compliance Audits

Part of this audit includes making sure merchants stay within the recommended number of chargebacks and ensuring that each business is fully compliant with Visa's credit card processing guidelines. Among other things, acquiring banks and payment service providers are required to make sure merchants are only selling approved goods and services as well as making sure each business has obtained the appropriate licenses.

The credit card company also checks to see if payment service providers and acquiring banks are visiting the merchants' locations as well as their fulfillment company locations. As a result, acquiring banks and payment service providers have been implementing new risk compliance departments as well as hiring and training new employees.

Instabill Keeps Compliant with Visa Regulations

As a payment service provider, we have increased our in-house risk management and ongoing due diligence. As well as working with our banking partners, we established our own risk compliance department to support our account managers in investigating that our merchants operate legal and legitimate businesses. While our risk compliance department reviews merchants' underwriting documents and investigates online reputations, Instabill has significantly increased visits to merchant locations.

Expanding Our Solutions to Help Your Business Grow

In 2012, Instabill implemented many changes and has seen a lot of growth. In the past nine months, we have welcomed more than six new acquiring banks to our Partner Program—three of which provide domestic, U.S.-based merchant accounts. This allows us to offer credit card processing solutions to merchants in a wide range of industries, but being able to offer multiple merchant accounts through one payment gateway is another huge benefit.

"We always encourage merchants to have one or two additional merchant accounts," said Instabill CEO Jason Field. "If an acquiring bank terminates a business's merchant account for no apparent reason, it can still continue to process credit cards without interruptions."

When to Open Multiple Merchant Accounts

There are many benefits of opening multiple merchant accounts, including having more credit card processing options and processing for multiple websites. However, opening multiple merchant accounts can help you avoid lost profits if an acquiring bank terminates your merchant account. We recommend that you open multiple merchant accounts if:

• You process more than $100,000 a month
• Your number of monthly chargebacks and your chargeback ratio border Visa and/or
  MasterCard's thresholds
• You operate a business in a high risk industry, such as adult services, online dating,
  e-cigarettes, travel agencies, or gaming
• You operate your business from a high risk country or in an offshore jurisdiction

Credit Card Processing with Instabill

For more information on how you can process credit cards with a fully compliant payment service provider, contact us online or call us toll-free at 1-800-318-2713.

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A partnership between Discover Financial Services and Russian Standard Bank (RSB) formed back in 2011 with an agreement that the bank would issue and service Diners Club credit cards. However, that has recently changed. On Sept. 4, the two institutions extended their agreement, which now allows the bank to issue, accept, and promote Discover credit cards in Russia. This is one very important milestone for Discover Financial since this will be the first time Discover cards will be issued in Europe.

Discover is the smallest credit card network out of its toughest competitors—Visa, MasterCard, and American Express—but the company has been hard at work expanding its global footprint. Outside of the U.S., banks in Ecuador, China, and India are able to issue Discover and/or Diners Club credit cards.

For the full Discover Financial Services press release, visit www.InvestorRelations.DiscoverFinancial.com.

A New Option for RSB Merchant Accounts

This agreement extension is great news for merchants too. If you have a merchant account with Russian Standard Bank, you will be able to process credit cards from Discover cardholders. This will allow you to give your customers a new payment option and even generate new customers.

Instabill Merchant Account Services

Instabill has a vast network of banking partners from different regions of the world allowing our merchants to process all major credit cards through our payment gateway and merchant account solutions. Credit cards you can accept with an Instabill merchant account include Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, UnionPay, JCB, and Diners Club. Contact us online for more information about our merchant services.

Recent market research shows that more than 65% of users browse the World Wide Web using Google. If you want those users to see your site, it is necessary to follow some of Google's rules. Below are three tips to help you streamline your e-commerce website using Google.

Connect with Google

The starting point for any website should be to connecting it with Google Analytics, Google AdWords, and other webmaster tools. Be sure you properly setup these tools in your website and on Google so you do not run into any errors.

Next, you will want to enable e-commerce tracking and establish goals in Google Analytics. Your goals will measure a webpage within your site that you want consumers to find. This goal may be a thank you page after a completed purchase or it may be a landing page to test its effectiveness.

Thankfully, there are several videos available online that can help you setup Google Analytics.

If you have a local target market, you can pin your business to Google Maps and Google Products. Both are equally critical if you want to give your customers a way to rank your products or services, and to share their reviews through social networking. The most recent updates to the Google SERP system put an emphasis on social media, so make sure you create accounts for Google+, Twitter, and Facebook. Also, make sure you advertise your social media presence so your customers can join your circle, follow you, or like your fan page.

Once these basic pieces are in place, you should be able to interpret your Google Analytics data and page rank.

Meta Data Research

If you are purchasing ads with your Google AdWords account, you should use the tools it offers. Create a spreadsheet that lists the keywords and content that are important to you and use Google's Keyword Tool to find out how many global and local searches there are per keyword and/or keyword phrase. If the keyword ranks as highly competitive, you may want to add some of Google's suggested keywords or rewrite your content to adapt to the demands of your market.

Honing Your Brand

When you create your website, the content, meta data, and brand image significantly affect your ability to keep up with market demands. Be sure you enable Google's weekly reports so you can track your site's statistics.

Now that you know what keywords and keyword phrases you want to use for your products and services pages, consider growing your brand by building a blog, FAQ section, or articles section. Above all, stay on top of your search engine results and sales productivity.

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I recently returned from a vacation in Kuwait—the country in the Middle East where I was born and lived for most of my life. What most people do not realize is that Kuwait is a multicultural country where you meet not only Arabs, but also foreigners from all over the world. Although Arabic is my first language, I grew up speaking to people in many different languages.

Since I started working at Instabill, I have been helping merchants from all over the world. My favorite merchants are those from the Middle East—Kuwait, UAE, Jordan, and Turkey to name a few. Speaking to these merchants in Arabic reminds me of home and helps build a firm foundation of trust between us. From the minute our conversation begins, I feel as if I am their Internet merchant account mentor!

Recently, a business owner from Dubai submitted a merchant account application for his online IT classes, and I had a very easy time getting him approved. He explained to me how difficult it was trying to communicate his credit card processing needs to other payment service providers due to the language barrier, and what a blessing it was speaking with a merchant account specialist who also spoke Arabic. In a short amount of time talking with the merchant, I was able to find the best merchant account solution and lowest rates for his business in the Middle East.

Here at Instabill, we are able to provide merchant accounts to businesses in the Middle East that work in a variety of different industries including adult entertainment, IT support, licensed pharmacies, and e-cigarettes. If you need an online merchant account that will work in the Middle East, call me today at 1-800-318-2713 or contact me online so we can figure out your online credit card processing needs.

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Instabill CEO Jason Field spends a decent amount of time away from the office on business trips. Between conferences, expos, and trips to meet with new banking partners, expenses add up fast. So, when we saw an article on FoxBusiness.com about international acceptance of corporate credit cards, we thought of you—our merchants and partners who travel to expand their business networks.

The survey results reflect 206 unique travelers who, over the past year, have made at least four international business trips. Most business travelers understand the importance of international acceptance of corporate credit cards, but they rely on their company to provide them with the right credit card for the region in which they will be traveling.

International Corporate Credit Card Acceptance

Mr. Field travels to countries all over the world—China, Japan, Germany, France, England, and Mauritius to name a few. MasterCard's survey reveals what other regions people most commonly travel to on business.

Europe: 81%
Asia/Pacific: 55%
Canada: 64%
South America: 51%
Mexico: 49%
Caribbean: 39%
Middle East: 32%
Africa: 26%

However, not all of these regions are as accepting of corporate credit cards as we are here in the United States. On a scale of 1 to 5, the survey respondents rated each country on how accepting its merchants were.

Canada: 4.82
Europe: 4.46
Mexico: 4.14
Caribbean: 4.08
Asia/Pacific: 4.04
South America: 3.97
Middle East: 3.92
Africa: 3.29

Also discussed in the survey results was the growth of worldwide acceptance of corporate brand credit cards. Visa and MasterCard have 33.3 million worldwide merchant locations, JCB has 20.8 million, Diners Club/Discover and BC Card have 19 million locations, American Express has 15.8 million, Maestro has 14.1 million, and China UnionPay has 10.7 million merchant locations worldwide that accept corporate credit cards. Just five years ago, Visa and MasterCard only had 26 million merchant locations worldwide that accepted corporate credit card brands.

Mr. Field's American Express Fiasco

On a recent trip to France, Mr. Field nearly found himself having to wash dishes in a restaurant kitchen where he dined because the establishment did not accept American Express credit cards. Luckily, the restaurant owner resolved the fiasco by running his credit card through the POS terminal at a neighboring restaurant.

"Since that incident," said Mr. Field, "I now make sure I don't leave home without at least two different types of credit cards as well as cash."

Corporate Credit Card Use

While reading the survey results, we found several interesting facts related to how business travelers use their corporate credit cards.

1. 95% of international business travelers have found merchants who do not accept any credit cards at all
2. 94% of international business travelers consider corporate credit card acceptance as one of the most important deciding factors when applying for company credit cards
3. 93% of business travel expenses are purchased with company credit cards
4. 78% of travelers are required to use their company credit cards for business purchases
5. 73% of travelers have encountered merchants who do not accept corporate credit cards, but do accept personal credit cards

Using Cash for Business Travel

What about the other 7% of business travel expenses that are not purchased with company credit cards? According to MasterCard's survey, more than 33% of travelers use their personal credit cards so they can earn reward points and more than 25% prefer to pay with cash. Purchases made with cash include:

Taxi fares
Train tickets
Car rentals
Airfare
Hotel rooms
Restaurant bills
Restaurant tips
Entertainment

Bringing You the Latest

Do you want more information on the survey results? Read MasterCard's full white paper, International View: In Search of Acceptance, here. Be sure to visit our blog regularly for more credit card tips, facts, news, and events.