In modern conditions of development of information banking technologies and communications, acquiring has gained great popularity. What is it and how does this technology work? Let's consider in more detail.
Basic concepts
Most stores and other retail outlets that carry out cash settlements with customers accept plastic credit cards to pay for their goods and services. This method has its advantages for both the client and the seller, who knows perfectly what acquiring is and skillfully uses its advantages.
So, this economic term refers to a method of payment for any goods or services rendered, which uses a plastic card and a special terminal. Acquiring can be virtual, that is, calculations are carried out on the Internet without physically presenting a card.
Varieties
There are three main types of service in question:
- trade acquiring - with it you can pay for purchased goods or services rendered, for this you need a credit card;
- Internet acquiring - makes it possible to make purchases on various sites using the interface provided for this;
- exchange acquiring - allows you to receive cash using an ATM or other similar equipment.
Trading Acquiring
As already mentioned before, most retail outlets and service enterprises allow you to pay for purchased goods or services rendered with a plastic card. For this, only a special terminal is needed.
In this case, no additional fees are charged from the card account of the buyer. In addition, this form of payment allows you to not have large sums of money with you, which, of course, is very convenient.
We will talk about the benefits for business owners a little later, but now we can say that acquiring can significantly expand the client base.
Documenting
An acquiring agreement is usually concluded between a representative of a store or retail chain and a banking institution. But this is only the formal side of the issue. In fact, when filling out the relevant documents for acquiring, the bank is only a representative of payment systems.
They, who are widely known around the world for their brands Visa, MasterCard, UnionPay, American Express, own all the information about what is acquiring bank cards. Therefore, they take on the entire technical side of the issue.
Benefits for Banks
Speaking about what acquiring is, one cannot but touch upon the question of its advantages for banking institutions. They get the main profit from the commission. It represents a certain amount of cash deductions from each transaction with a bank card, regardless of the particular outlet. Its size is determined individually, this item is entered into the acquiring agreement.
The following factors are taken into account:
- scope of financial and economic activity of the enterprise;
- the amount of trading revenue for a certain period;
- duration of work;
- number and size of outlets;
- type of communication between the terminal and the bank's servers.
By the way, some part of the commission received is transferred to the address of the payment system and to the account of the issuing bank of the payment card, which also affects the final amount.
The banking business under consideration is characterized by the presence of high competition, because the size of the commission is usually the same and amounts to 1.5-2 percent of the total payment.
Requirements for Participants
If you want to connect to this system, you need to contact the appropriate banking institution. Specialists in working with clients will tell in more detail what acquiring is, will introduce you to the terms of service and other nuances.
After the conclusion of the contract, the network member is assigned his personal identifier associated with the current bank account. By the way, not every client who wants to carry out trade acquiring receives permission for this. Often a strict selection is made, aimed at suppressing possible fraudulent activities with plastic cards. To confirm the financial and economic activities may require the provision of an additional package of documents.
All organizational issues typically take between one and four weeks. After that, the banking institution transfers the necessary number of terminals to the client for temporary use, through which acquiring is carried out. What it is, other specialists who install and configure the equipment will already explain. After that, you can safely switch to settlements in cashless form.
All services for registration, connection and training of personnel are usually free of charge. The cost of renting terminals is negotiated individually.
Those business entities who understand what acquiring is, are well aware of its advantages. Numerous studies show that stores where you can pay by credit card are preferable for buyers and increase their trading revenue. This is due to several reasons:
- convenience of calculations;
- cash limit;
- personal preferences;
- psychological motives.
Internet settlements
One of the varieties of the financial services under consideration is Internet acquiring. It also represents a system of cashless payments using plastic cards, however, the trading platform here is a website on the Internet or a specialized program.
In this way, you can sell a variety of goods and services, except those that are expressly prohibited by the main representatives of international settlement systems, namely:
- medications;
- medical supplies;
- illegal audio and video recordings;
- firearms;
- dangerous and perishable goods;
- fake and counterfeit products.
Any Internet portal, store or other similar site cannot function normally in modern realities without providing for its users the possibility of settlements using plastic cards. Internet acquiring can be connected in two ways:
- Direct agreement with a banking institution. In this case, the services are provided by the specified financial institution, which independently processes all cash transactions, transfers funds between counterparties and settles other payments with participants in the system. The provision of this service is paid by the owner of the resource on the Internet. It should be noted that the size of such deductions is slightly higher than in trade acquiring, due to the higher cost of operations.
- Using service providers. These organizations transfer information about payments made from sellers to banks. Such a scheme allows counterparties to receive a large amount of analytical data on financial and economic operations, as well as more finely manage commodity and cash flows.
Thus, the latter option of acquiring provides, in contrast to banks, much wider opportunities.Moreover, some service providers provide very easy to read information, designed in the form of graphs that change in real time.
How to connect online acquiring
To connect your site to the system of payments under consideration, it is necessary to go through several stages:
- bring the Internet resource in accordance with the requirements of international payment systems;
- enter interface elements responsible for the calculations;
- prepare a section containing public offer providing for the return of the spent amounts in certain circumstances;
- Set icons of used payment systems.
After that, your resource is checked by security specialists of a financial institution. This process is often formal in nature, you just need to properly draw up the necessary contracts and permits.
When using a service provider, the latter takes care of all organizational issues, including bringing your site in accordance with the requirements, without which it is impossible to connect acquiring.
System flaws
Acquiring service is performed by complex software systems created by man. Therefore, the process of its functioning is not immune from errors. In addition, there may be malfunctions in the hardware of the complex. All this leads to the fact that instead of facilitating settlements, the buyer spends a lot more time at the checkout than he expected.
In addition, in some cases, employees of the outlet refused to refund money for the goods, citing the lack of technical capabilities. This is not true, since the terminal has a special team responsible for this procedure.
There are cases of intentional fraud. The seller can specifically enter an amount that will be more than the value of the goods. To prevent such cases, it is advisable to carefully study the received checks.
Conclusion
Undoubtedly, the use of advanced technologies in trade and financial activities is determined not only by desire, but also by necessity. In some cases, for example, when making payments on the Internet, acquiring is almost the only option. Therefore, the sooner the business owner realizes this axiom and joins the considered payment system, the faster it will feel its positive impact on the business.
