Once you’ve set up your E-commerce store, the next step is to find a reputable credit card processor for it. The best credit card processors for online shopping do more than just make sure the transaction is safe and secure.
Check each company’s fees twice and make sure that the transaction fees they charge you, the business owner, are competitive.
A trustworthy credit card processor not only gets more visitors to buy from you, but it also gives your brand a sense of authority. Using trusted and well-known vendors can be just as good for your brand as having a great store design.
What does it mean to process credit cards?
To put it simply, an E-commerce credit card processor is an online payment system that lets the user pay for their purchase safely.
In the online market, there are many E-commerce credit card processors, but not all of them can be trusted. We’ve put together a list of some of the best credit card processors for E-commerce to help you choose the right one for your store.
When looking for a payment partner, these are the things you should think about.
- PCI Compliance: The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) is a set of security rules meant to keep online payments safe.
PCI is run by the PCI SSC, which is an independent council made up of the biggest credit card companies like MasterCard, Visa, Discover, American Express, and JCB. PCI is used by almost all of the major card issuers.
To be one of the best E-commerce credit card processors, a company must follow the rules set by the PCI SSC. Remember that “SSL” has nothing to do with PCI DSS. An SSL certificate makes sure that the website loads securely. It doesn’t change PCI DSS compliance much, if at all.
- Buyer Protection: Another thing that the big E-commerce credit card processors offer is full protection for the buyer. The processor helps the buyer finish and manage online transactions quickly. As an example, PayPal is a payment gateway that gives users special discounts, an app that is easy to use, and easy ways to connect to other products that are commonly used.
- Easy To Set Up: Some of the best Ecommerce card processors let the user set up their account in as little as one to three days. If you put in all the right information, the processor should be able to verify the information in no more than 3 days.
- Fast payment processing: If your account is already set up and your internet is working, it should only take a few seconds for an E-commerce payment processor to process and confirm payment.
- Reliability: Today, people all over the world are very interested in and concerned about data privacy. Integrity and being honest are very important, especially if you run an online store. If the E-commerce credit card processor you use isn’t very reliable and has a good name, it’s likely that visitors will never become customers.
The best credit card processors for online stores in 2023
PayPal
2.9% for each transaction
PayPal is one of the best and most popular ways to use a credit card for online shopping. PayPal has a window for transactions that is completely safe and flexible.
They charge a fee of 2.9% for each transaction, but you don’t have to pay a monthly fee. This is great for small E-commerce stores or online shops that use the dropshipping model because the fees are flexible.
The PayPal UX is easy to use, and the system for processing payments is lightning fast, so it’s a great way to do business. It’s a great choice for retailers who don’t make much money each month or who are just starting out. PayPal has basic point-of-sale (POS) features and is easy to set up.
As a customer, you can always get help from PayPal, which is another point to make in PayPal’s favor.
The company has a huge Knowledge Base, forums that are always being updated, and excellent customer service that you can reach by phone or email. “PayPal Payments Pro,” which lets you set up a virtual terminal, costs just $30 per month.
What’s the verdict? This credit card processor for E-commerce is easy to set up and has a lot of options. If a lot of people come to your store and you make a lot of sales.
Stripe
Charge: 2.9% plus $0.30 cents per transaction
Stripe is another one of our favorite credit card processors for E-commerce that you can use for your online store. Stripe charges 30 cents for each transaction and has a fixed fee. PayPal can’t handle payments from North Korea, Bangladesh, and a lot of other places.
Where your business is based could affect which countries you can’t do business with. Stripe, on the other hand, does accept payments from all of these and many more countries.
With the company’s free API, you can make a customized checkout process for your online store. Stripe is easy to use and can handle in-app purchases and marketplace transactions quickly and easily. With their own payment gateway, Stripe makes it easy to pay for something.
Stripe is a great alternative gateway and a young company that is growing quickly.
Square
2.75 percent per transaction
Square is just a great way to handle payments. We think it’s the best mobile credit card processor out there because of how easy it is to use, how cheap transactions are, and how easy it is to set up.
This credit card processor for e-commerce works well with both IOS and Android devices. Small businesses should choose it because there is no monthly fee.
Square has Magstripe, contactless, and chip terminals, stands, and registers that let you accept payments anywhere you do business. Their customer service is top-notch.
Square is a great payment processor for all kinds of E-commerce models, including online food stores, retail shops, and service providers. Square even has powerful software that makes it easy to manage sales and employees.
With all of these features, it’s a great choice for any kind of business. Taking everything into account, Square is a much better choice than PayPal.
Flagship Merchant Services
Fee: 2.30 to 2.50%
Since 2008, Flagship Merchant Services has been the top-rated merchant account provider. Flagship has POS (point-of-sale) systems and smart terminals to make sure that your transactions go as smoothly as possible, no matter what your needs are.
Flagship is a credit card processor for e-commerce. It has EMV/NFC terminals that let people pay with chip cards and other ways.
This credit card processor is PCI-compliant and has a low cost per transaction. This gives Flagship customers the best protection against fraud. Flagship offers all-around solutions for most types of businesses, including products for In-store, Mobile, Online, or MOTO. So that transactions can happen quickly, they offer approvals on the same day.
The best thing about Flagship is that small and mid-sized businesses have known for a long time that they can be trusted. They are always ready to help their clients and suppliers do well.
Amazon Pay
2.90% fee per transaction
Amazon Pay is one of the best ways to use a credit card, and it seems to be the way things are going to be in the future. Since Amazon is such a well-known brand around the world, it’s easy for visitors to a wide range of E-commerce stores to trust this credit card processor.
It’s a great way to pay for things, and there are no monthly, annual, or PCI fees. The bad thing is that it takes about five days to get the money. Compared to other credit card processors, this time frame is a bit longer, but you can expect a better conversion.
Customers can easily pay with their Amazon account because Amazon has made the checkout process easier. No need to enter credit card data. After a few months of working with them, you can ask them to give you a better reserve term.
At the moment, Amazon Pay is mostly for businesses in the United States. The Amazon support system is very good, and you can easily set up Amazon Payment on your E-commerce store by using their knowledge base.
You can fill out a form on their website to get in touch with their sales team. For basic help, you can also call, chat online, or send an email. This is one of the best ways to use credit cards for online shopping in the United States.
Fattmerchant
Fattmerchant is a good choice for a first-time credit card processor if you just opened an online store and want to accept credit cards.
Fattmerchant was made for small businesses and stores that have sales during certain times of the year. They even have a “pause” button for when the season is over. This company offers flat pricing, pricing based on a subscription, and pricing based on an exchange.
If you already have a well-known e-commerce store that makes a decent amount of money, you should also think about this option. They’re doing a lot of things right.
This E-commerce credit card processor gives you a lot of tools to help you manage online payments and accept them easily. They support all of the ways that you can pay them. You can accept payments with POS hardware, a web app, on-site, a virtual terminal, or even a card reader on your phone.
Fattmerchant doesn’t charge any fees for leaving the service early. This processor has options that work with most point-of-sale (POS) systems. When your store isn’t making sales, the pause feature drops your costs from $99 per month to $25. In addition to its huge knowledge base, Fattmerchant has great live support that is available around the clock.
Helcim
Helcim is a credit card processor for e-commerce that has a simple, clear pricing model. They have different price ranges for non-profits, sales in person, and sales online.
- In person sales: 0.25% plus 8 cents
- Online sales: 0.45% plus 25 cents
- 0.1% plus 10 cents on sales to non-profit groups
There are no early termination fees with Helcim, but if your business does less than 15,000 transactions a month, this may not be the best choice. When your shop sells more each month, you can expect to get serious discounts.
Helcim lets third-party platforms like Shopify, Magento, and other well-known E-commerce platforms connect to it. You can also export transactions to a.CSV file so that they can be used by other apps that are not supported. Helcim gets high marks from its customers and an A+ from the Better Business Bureau.
With “How-to” guides that are easy to follow, it’s easy to get started and set up the processor in your web-shop. Helcim makes mobile payments, like Apple Pay and Android Pay, safe and easy. Using Helcim, you can add multi-currency services to a store that supports more than one language.
This means that your customers can pay you in the currency of their choice. Support is quick to respond and very helpful. When you add this to all the other great things Helcim has to offer, you have a recipe for a great partner for new dropshipping stores.
Shopify
Shopify is a full E-commerce solution. It offers everything from an E-commerce platform to a way to accept credit cards.
Since Shopify works with Oberlo, it’s easy to set up a dropshipping store in just a few minutes. Shopify has a POS that can help your online store run more smoothly as it grows. They offer many ways to pay with a mobile device and are a good choice for people who don’t want to spend a lot on an E-commerce solution on its own.
The most affordable Shopify plan costs $9 per month and 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction. It comes with a POS already built in, and it also works with a lot of third-party apps that can help you give your customers a professional E-commerce experience while also making your business easier to run.
You don’t even have to leave the Shopify platform to find products for your store. You can use apps like printful and Oberlo.
Shopify makes custom reports for every sale, which makes it easy to run your store. The Shopify app works with all browsers, and the mobile app for both Android and iOS devices works perfectly.
Shopify’s customer service is second to none. You can get help 24/7 from them through their official email, a live chat, a phone call, or Twitter.
Payline
Payline is an independent sales group that works well with businesses of all sizes. Payline Data has a pricing plan that is easy to understand and affordable. They also have great plans for people who don’t sell a lot. Their two main sources of income are:
- Start: Helps both stationary and mobile point-of-sale (POS) devices. The “Start” plan costs 0.2% of each transaction plus 10 cents, plus a monthly fee of $10.
- Connect: This plan is made for E-commerce vendors in particular. It’s a way for people to pay online with high-end security features and integrations.
Payline also has a special pricing plan for non-profit organizations that gives them a discount. Payline is PCI compliant, and there are no fees for leaving early. Payline is a good choice for high-risk merchants because it makes it easy to handle invoices.
First Data
One of the best credit card processors in the U.S. is First Data. It’s a great choice for online stores that sell a lot of things. Merchants from more than a hundred different countries use this credit card processor. First Data is worth a look if you have a lot of people coming to your online store.
One of the biggest credit card processors in the world is First Data merchant services. They have a staff of well-trained people who can help you with any E-commerce problem you might have.
First Data is not the cheapest option, but compared to other processors, it has a lot to offer. One thing that makes First Data one of the best credit card processors for retail is that its prices are open to negotiation.
If a merchant does a lot of business, they can often get better terms and more competitive pricing. If you want to reach people in China, this is a great choice because it works with AliPay.
First Data has clover processing equipment, benefits for veterans, tools to help you build loyalty programs for your customers, and a few other unique value-adds that you won’t find with the competition.
Payment Depot
Payment Depot is a cheap credit card processor for large sales, which can be very profitable for businesses that do a certain amount of business.
They offer different membership plans for businesses of different sizes. You can fill out an online application to get started. Interchange-plus pricing is available from Payment Depot, and monthly subscriptions range from $49 to $199.
On top of the interchange rate, they charge a fee of $0.15 to $0.05 per transaction. You can buy an annual subscription with a 90-day satisfaction guarantee that lets you get a full refund if you change your mind and want to use a different processor.
What is the best way for you to pay?
PayPal is a popular option, and many online stores use it, but don’t think that’s your only choice. There are a lot of really strong providers out there who can help your business be more productive by giving it features and services that fit its needs.
Stripe is a good choice if most of your customers are from another country. Square is a good choice for small and medium-sized businesses.
If you want to grow your business over time and make the most of easy conversions, Amazon Pay might be a better fit for you. Take the time to think about your needs and look into options that will help you reach your goals and the goals of your company.
When you sell things online, you need to watch out for chargebacks. How they work is explained in this article.