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Stripe makes none of the hardware that is currently available (the BBPOS Chipper™ 2X BT or Verifone P400). Not sure which processing platform they are riding at

by posguy 5y ago

Stripe makes none of the hardware that is currently available (the BBPOS Chipper™ 2X BT or Verifone P400). Not sure which processing platform they are riding atop of these days (perhaps Tsys?) but we maintain a separate First Data account and CardConnect integration since Stripe's support for certain BINs of business cards is lacking. Said banks expect a breakdown of what was taxable to be sent along with the transaction, otherwise the transaction will be declined. 2.7% + $0.05 per transaction is expensive for in person payments. We are averaging 1.2% (since debit is so cheap) for our First Data account, with next day funding (Stripe has variable delivery, sometimes taking up to a week).

notwhereyouare 5y ago
I’m seeing something similar with my company. Around 1-1.5% for our transactions with next day funding. Granted, we do pay a monthly fee that we wouldn’t with stripe. But with our volume, we are saving money
Mandatum 5y ago
The best thing about Stripe was they made payment processors move. By showing them what good looks like, by showing them there's value in creating an easier, modern platform - their competitors are missing out on a massive market of SMB's that won't care enough for the 1.5% difference in costs. Which is admittedly crazy, but there's a lot of people out there making purchasing and implementation decisions that don't really care about the bottom line.
- danpalmer 5y ago
  For an SMB, the 1.5% difference in costs could very reasonably be worth it over the extra time spent integrating with a different company. I work for an online retailer and with Stripe we spend almost no time working on our payments infrastructure because Stripe handles so much of it. That's worth quite a lot to us! Also bear in mind that the 1.5% difference might be on the sticker price, but Stripe fees are negotiable and closer to industry norms at scale.
edwinwee 5y ago
(I work at Stripe.) Keep in mind that Stripe Terminal has upfront pricing: there are no additional software, PCI compliance, or monthly fees (or even equipment lease payments!). When factoring in these additional fees that many legacy players charge on top of the payment processing, Terminal oftentimes has more favorable pricing (along with working alongside your existing online Stripe transactions). If you want funds in minutes, we have Instant Payouts in the US, Canada, and Singapore now, which lets you cash out to a debit card right away for a small processing fee. Our standard bank transfers are limited by existing banking infrastucture (e.g. the ACH network), but most transfers land within 2 days. For BINs support—I'm sorry for those issues. Would you be able to email me and I can see if we can work on this? edwin@stripe.com
- teamspirit 5y ago
  I'm still waiting for the ability to pay for an invoice using terminal. The use cases being a user sends an invoice to a customer and then collect payment for that invoice in person.
  - edwinwee 5y ago
    That's a neat idea! Adding to the list.
- posguy 5y ago
  Stripe Terminal's upfront pricing is neat, but it would triple the processing fees of most 3+ lane retail stores while still lacking reporting of tax (causing many business cards to decline), FSA/HSA, EBT and WIC support. I'm not going to hunt down test cards for you, but DataCap should have a few they can share if you ping them.
- rschapman 5y ago
  Could you speak more to the part about PCI compliance? My experience has been that you can provide an AOC for provided services but it doesn't make someone's PCI obligations go away entirely. Even a PCI recognized point to point encrypted solution doesn't completely remove all PCI-DSS obligations. Maybe for folks that do a SAQ it would largely make issues go away but a larger entity doing a full ROC/AOC I would imagine would still have a fair amount of work to go through. Do you also happen to work as a merchant acquirer in such a way that you can remove further PCI burden?
dangerboysteve 5y ago
In Canada my wife was using https://www.helcim.com https://www.helcim.com , they work with Elevon. Great service overall. We were paying an average of 1.9% for in-person chip and that was due to to all the reward cards and Amex. Interac debit (not visa debit) was 9 cents per transaction. Next day deposits as well.
joshstrange 5y ago
Yeah, I was excited about this news but I'm having a hard time not wanting to go with CardConnect and a Bolt reader due to the lower costs. I really like the Stripe docs but there are some products (including a would-be-cool-to-have feature of something I'm currently working on) that are just impossible with the fees Stripe charges. I would almost swallow the 2.9% if not for the $.30 hit per transaction. As it stands today I'm fully built on Stripe but after I prove it all works in "production" I'm considering switching to CC. While their docs suck in comparison there is just way too much money (and un-buildable-features) that are being left on the table when it comes to Stripe. For reference: I use CC for my $dayJob and while it's far from as nice as Stripe in just about every way, it's easy enough to code against. Just be ok with having to build out more infrastructure and store more data on your end to get close to what Stripe provides. That said, I think I'm ok with that if it means not having to pay $0.30/transaction and the high %.

by posguy 5y ago

notwhereyouare 5y ago

I’m seeing something similar with my company. Around 1-1.5% for our transactions with next day funding. Granted, we do pay a monthly fee that we wouldn’t with stripe. But with our volume, we are saving money

Mandatum 5y ago

The best thing about Stripe was they made payment processors move. By showing them what good looks like, by showing them there's value in creating an easier, modern platform - their competitors are missing out on a massive market of SMB's that won't care enough for the 1.5% difference in costs. Which is admittedly crazy, but there's a lot of people out there making purchasing and implementation decisions that don't really care about the bottom line.

danpalmer 5y ago
For an SMB, the 1.5% difference in costs could very reasonably be worth it over the extra time spent integrating with a different company. I work for an online retailer and with Stripe we spend almost no time working on our payments infrastructure because Stripe handles so much of it. That's worth quite a lot to us! Also bear in mind that the 1.5% difference might be on the sticker price, but Stripe fees are negotiable and closer to industry norms at scale.

edwinwee 5y ago

(I work at Stripe.) Keep in mind that Stripe Terminal has upfront pricing: there are no additional software, PCI compliance, or monthly fees (or even equipment lease payments!). When factoring in these additional fees that many legacy players charge on top of the payment processing, Terminal oftentimes has more favorable pricing (along with working alongside your existing online Stripe transactions). If you want funds in minutes, we have Instant Payouts in the US, Canada, and Singapore now, which lets you cash out to a debit card right away for a small processing fee. Our standard bank transfers are limited by existing banking infrastucture (e.g. the ACH network), but most transfers land within 2 days. For BINs support—I'm sorry for those issues. Would you be able to email me and I can see if we can work on this? edwin@stripe.com

teamspirit 5y ago
I'm still waiting for the ability to pay for an invoice using terminal. The use cases being a user sends an invoice to a customer and then collect payment for that invoice in person.
- edwinwee 5y ago
  That's a neat idea! Adding to the list.
posguy 5y ago
Stripe Terminal's upfront pricing is neat, but it would triple the processing fees of most 3+ lane retail stores while still lacking reporting of tax (causing many business cards to decline), FSA/HSA, EBT and WIC support. I'm not going to hunt down test cards for you, but DataCap should have a few they can share if you ping them.
rschapman 5y ago
Could you speak more to the part about PCI compliance? My experience has been that you can provide an AOC for provided services but it doesn't make someone's PCI obligations go away entirely. Even a PCI recognized point to point encrypted solution doesn't completely remove all PCI-DSS obligations. Maybe for folks that do a SAQ it would largely make issues go away but a larger entity doing a full ROC/AOC I would imagine would still have a fair amount of work to go through. Do you also happen to work as a merchant acquirer in such a way that you can remove further PCI burden?

dangerboysteve 5y ago

In Canada my wife was using https://www.helcim.com https://www.helcim.com , they work with Elevon. Great service overall. We were paying an average of 1.9% for in-person chip and that was due to to all the reward cards and Amex. Interac debit (not visa debit) was 9 cents per transaction. Next day deposits as well.

joshstrange 5y ago

Yeah, I was excited about this news but I'm having a hard time not wanting to go with CardConnect and a Bolt reader due to the lower costs. I really like the Stripe docs but there are some products (including a would-be-cool-to-have feature of something I'm currently working on) that are just impossible with the fees Stripe charges. I would almost swallow the 2.9% if not for the $.30 hit per transaction. As it stands today I'm fully built on Stripe but after I prove it all works in "production" I'm considering switching to CC. While their docs suck in comparison there is just way too much money (and un-buildable-features) that are being left on the table when it comes to Stripe. For reference: I use CC for my $dayJob and while it's far from as nice as Stripe in just about every way, it's easy enough to code against. Just be ok with having to build out more infrastructure and store more data on your end to get close to what Stripe provides. That said, I think I'm ok with that if it means not having to pay $0.30/transaction and the high %.