A payment gateway is your doorway to making sales online.  A Payment gateway will allow you to charge your customers credit/debit card with the purchase he/she makes online.

Payment Gateway authorizes you to take card payments directly from your website. The payment gateway acts as a mediator between the transactions that take place on your website and the payment processor.  This is needed because it is prohibited, due to security reasons, to transmit transaction information directly from your website to a payment processor. Most online merchant accounts come with a payment gateway included, like PayPal.

Payment processors or Acquirers are the financial institutions that work in the background to provide all the payment processing services used by an online merchant. These companies usually have partnerships with other companies that directly deal with consumers or merchants.Payment Processors usually dont market their services and prefer to stay in the background, processing payments for Independent sales organizations (ISOs) and Member service providers (MSPs) who have partnered with them

Merchant accounts are the type of bank accounts that authorize you to accept credit or debit cards payments online. These accounts are required if you want to use a payment gateway to process transactions from your website.

In all cases, to acquire a merchant account, one must have some sort of arrangement with a payment processor to charge a customers credit/debit card.There are a variety of payment gateways and payment processors out there. They vary in the monthly fees they charge, transaction costs they incur and in various other aspects. It is vital to choose the right company for your merchant account if you plan to run an online business.

There are three main requirements for a payment gateway to work:

A website that meets the security and eligibility requirements for the bank to issue a merchant account

A merchant account from a bank. A merchant account is a special kind of bank account that can be linked directly to a payment gateway. These bank accounts are issued only upon review of a website to ensure it meets privacy and security requirements. Requirements often include an SSL certificate and a privacy policy.

A payment gateway provider. Payment gateway providers offer the server that acts as the link between your website and the bank. The server has a very special configuration and a very high level of security due to the sensitive nature of the data being transferred.

A payment gateway is beneficial for a few reasons:

Visitors stay on site: Many websites will take advantage of third party or hosted payment processing facilities such as PayPal. These facilities do work well and can provide secure payment options, however they do have draw backs. A major advantage of using a payment gateway is that customers will not leave your website to make payment. All user information and credit card details are inputted on your website meaning fewer steps for the buyer. Further to this, re-directing users to a separate website for payment often leads to mistrust and payment abandonments.

Real time transactions and payments: Utilizing a payment gateway allows you to accept credit cards directly on your website, but also means that these credit card transactions are processed in real-time. Real-time transactions mean that you as the merchant get paid immediately and that the customers get instant feedback as to whether their payment has been accepted or declined.

Saves time and reduces administration: A payment gateway saves time with the fact that credit cards are processed in real-time and funds are deposited directly into a merchant account. A payment gateway removes the need for manual card processing or third party account consolidation.

If you are looking to make payment integration to your organization / business website, we shall do that for you. Please contact us