Credit card machines

[Mike1958]

Good morning one and all,

We are currently setting up a SARL and have been looking at the pro's and cons of having either an E-Commerce solution for taking credit card payments, or taking one of the credit card machines from Credit Agricole. The charges are not that different, though with the e-commerce solutions there is a set up fee. I have two questions that hopefully you may be able to help with:

1. Has anyone had to make the same decision and if so what was the deciding factor

2. With the credit card machines from the bank are they able to use debit cards like the old UK Switch (now Maestro)

A fair portion of our business will be sold to clients in the UK paying in pounds.

Many thanks,

Mike

 

[Wendy]

Mike, there is a set-up fee for Credit Agricole too and PayPal is too dear for everything billing-wise...didn't you PM me a few weeks back with this same enquiry as regards a Chambres D'Hote ? Pretty sure you did.  We answered you to my knowledge and in great detail too.

Theoretically you can use a UK issued credit card machine if you can find a bank there to give you one knowing you are in France and are prepared to pay the costs; with a French issued machine you will not be able to take deposits/payments from Switch/Maestro cards unless the customer is present...useless really if you are doing B&B and wish to charge a deposit before they arrive - or charge a no-show if they book and do not show up without informing you.

Get in touch again if needed.

 

[Mike1958]

Many thanks Jura,

I have done a trawl through my old posts and don't think I have posted on this before - that being said the mind is not as good as it used to be. As a back up short term I have set up a PAYPAL business account with PAYPAL.FR but will be seeing the bank again in the next week or so to discuss further.

Regards,

[Russethouse]

Jura, I can only go from my own experience.

My belief is that it is far cheaper to have a CC machine in France than in the UK.

I frequently pay a business in France and on many occaisions that has been with debit card. This business has a French CC machine. Perhaps it was a facility they asked for on set up ?

[osie]

I posted on this site a few weeks ago about the same problem... I still dont have an ideal solution

All I can say is that I pay 15€ / month for the rental of the machine

1€ / transaction + 1% .. or something like that...

Annoyingly enough, I also pay about 15€ /month (0.10€ per call) to France Telecom for connecting to the bank and each morning for a summary.

It is not great.. and I heard Cred Arg might be a bit cheaper..

I a thinking if it is possible to send money to a uk account(for uk deposits) and then pay it in euros myself.. but I have a feeling this would not be allowed by the accountant.

Thanks

osie

[Quillan]

Well for what it's worth I use PayPal and as a merchant the costs are lower and people no longer require a PayPal account to pay me. We have a 'hidden' page on our website with PayPal icons on in about 5 different languages so people can select the best language for them. When we raise their reservation letter we send them a link to the 'hidden' page so they can pay their deposit. Our deposit is always 10% of the stay plus the cost of the first evening meal if they have booked one (we buy fresh food on the day and don't wnt to be out of pocket). We ONLY use this for deposits so the charge per transaction in is typically 1.83 Euros which is a little high perhaps but then there are no 'online banking' costs and no transfer costs to our bank account. When we started, 6 years ago, there was some reluctance by a few to use PayPal but this has all but disappeared know especially since they became owned by Ebay.

We don't ask for the balance until departure because of any extras that are added to the bill during the guests stay, not quite at the 500 Euros a day [;-)] but it can be up to 200 for a weeks stay. For final payment we only accept Euro Travellers Cheques, French Bank Cheques or cash. We stopped taking UK cheques for both deposit and final payment withing the first 18 months of trading, just too much grief and we always seemed to be out of pocket by the time we have actually got the money in to our French account. If push comes to shove there are always plenty of 'hole in the wall' machines around, you can give the guest a general idea of the final bill the day before so they can get some cash out whilst out and about.

The other thing people don't take in to account but which Osie has raised is the hidden cost of the actual dial up with the CC machine, that's another 10 cents to add on the transaction, not much but it is another 'fee'. Not only that but why should you pay to accept money for something you have sold, always seems a bit wrong to me.