Re: E-commerce site issue?

on 10/08/02 12:05 AM, The Gabster (gabster_ro@yahoo.com) wrote: > Thanks a lot... > Hmm... I gues for the beginning I would go and process the purchases > manually. Later on if the purchases increase, than I would opt for > proccesing credit cards via the server. So initially you would just store/transmit the credit cards securely (a whole other can of worms!!), and process them manually offline. I'd recommend this for any start-up e-commerce site, because it cuts down some development, start up costs and saves the margins that an online credit-card merchant takes. When and if you decide to automate the credit card process (authorising and charging the card), it's done through a merchant. This will totally depend on your circumstances and budget, but you basically pass the details to a third party that specialises in this stuff, like authorise.net (and hundreds of other similar business'), a bank or financial institution etc etc. All of them will have different procedures and code, but you basically pass them the details, they pass back a "success" or "failure", charge the credit card, take their % cut (everything from a flat fee like $1, through to 3% or 5%), and pass on the rest to you. There are further options above and beyond this, but they'd be out of reach/budget of almost any small-medium e-comm site.