[AusNOG] Merchant facilities, card services closure, etc.

[Ross Wheeler]

I'm guessing there's still a few of the "smaller" operators on this list.

Had a (legit) call from my bank this morning, advising me that the ancient 
old "paper" system I've been using for 26 years will cease to exist in 
2 months.

Seems the "card services" group (run by the credit card institutions 
themselves, not by the banks) is shutting down. I don't have a huge number 
of credit card transactions each month, but more than enough that manually 
punching them into a phone or POS terminal just ain't gunna happen, and 
same for doing it a card at a painful time through some web interface.

My old system used to simply spit out fully printed "merchant summary 
slips" that only needed folded and slipped into the provided envelope - no 
human interaction beyond a quick visual scan of each page (25 transactions 
per page).

I just want a simple system where a card, and an amount, can be shot to 
"somewhere" and processed, ideally with a receipt/accepted or 
declined/rejected response. One at a time that can be automated, or a 
batch, I don't care. Real-time or offline, I don't particularly mind.

I'm happy to change to (or open an additional facility with) another 
institution. I don't really care if it's a bank or not, as long as they're 
reputable, honest and easy to deal with while setting it up (and their 
fees are comparable with or less than I pay now <grin>).

Anyone else facing the same problems? I don't want to go down the 
direct-debit route, the majority of my customers currently either send 
dead trees, or do EFT, it's just a few hundred cards that linger...

TIA
RossW