You always have a reliable direct contact with your processing company to resolve any issues that may arise. In addition, Performance Card Service (PCS) acts as your liaison to the processor for the lifetime of your merchant account. We can always be reached via e-mail, phone or Skype for any account-related issues, and we strive to resolve all merchant issues as quickly as possible. Due to our large portfolios with each of our processing partners, we often get priority account-boarding and the quickest merchant support in the business. Our processing partners want to keep us happy and they know that our main goal is ensuring our clients are happy!
An area where many merchants need assistance is when their processing volumes or average tickets change. When your merchant account was approved, the issuing bank based the approval on what it expected your volume and average ticket size to be. If those numbers increase significantly, the bank may impose penalties, put a cap on your transactions or even close your account — all of which are almost sure to drastically limit your company’s ability to do business. And, because many businesses naturally grow and expand over time — sometimes dramatically — changes to processing volume and ticket size often occur.
Your direct contact at your merchant account provider and/or at PCS will help you communicate with the bank and address issues relating to these changes. The most important thing is to communicate early and often. If the bank understands what’s going on in your business, it is very likely to work with you to support your revenue growth. Sudden, drastic changes are the most worrisome type of changes from the issuing bank’s point of view. If you’ve been coasting along at a certain processing volume for 3 years, and it quadruples overnight, on the surface that looks like unnatural growth. Without communication from you, the assumption will be that some sort of fraudulent scheme is underway. However, if you have been communicating with the bank about a dramatic new product rollout that is forecast to open up a whole new market and quickly expand sales, the issuing bank will have more context in which to interpret the change in your processing pattern.
This is just one example of the type of issue that can jeopardize your merchant account without the assistance of your primary account contact. The bottom line here is not to put your merchant account on autopilot. Let your contact know how your business is going, especially changes with products, pricing, market area or other facets of sales and marketing that will affect how many orders you process and how large those orders are.
Frequent, open communication builds trust and paves the way to a long-term, constructive relationship with your merchant account provider and the issuing bank. Merchants sometimes overlook this because they are immersed in their day-to-day operations, not the mechanics of payment processing. In addition, because payment processing tends to run so smoothly, especially given the high quality of PCS partners, taking your merchant account for granted becomes easy. This is an important reason why PCS likes to stay in contact with you periodically, long after your merchant account has been set up. If changes appear on the horizon that could impact your merchant account, a short conversation with one of our specialists may bring it to light!