3-4 Card Present & Not Present Merchant Accounts

Card Present & Not Present Merchant Accounts

There are two very basic types of merchant accounts available: card present merchant accounts and card not present merchant accounts.

A card present merchant account is recognized by processors as the lowest risk way of processing credit cards, and refers to any type of merchant account where the customer and their credit card are present when a transaction takes place. Wireless merchant accounts , retail merchant accounts , and store-and-forward merchant accounts are all examples of card present merchant accounts. Although even the subcategories of these accounts have varying degrees of risk to the processor they are all considered lower risk methods of transacting credit cards.

Card not present merchant accounts are seen by processors as higher risk accounts because they are set up under the assumption that a customer and their credit card will not be present when a transaction takes place. An Online merchant account , touchtone telephone merchant account , and mail order merchant account are all examples of card not present accounts.

If you don't already have an idea of which type of account is best for your business, you don't need worry too much about it at this point. Each type of account is covered in detail in the pages and account-specific guides that follow.

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