4 ms·

Braintree has a very high monthly fee (200 a month min) and so does not seem good for startups (they seem to forget about the fact that startups grow). I tried

by ericb 18y ago

Braintree has a very high monthly fee (200 a month min) and so does not seem good for startups (they seem to forget about the fact that startups grow). I tried to negotiate with them... They came down to 100 min which was still more than double my other options. At this point when I said it was higher than I was comfortable with, the sales rep started asked me "what would you propose?" I wasn't sure how to answer that, but when I finally answered "how about matching or nearly matching the minimum given by x" (which was around 40 a month minimum) and I'll sign up today. At that point, the salesperson sent me a miffed-sounding response saying they can't go below the 100 a month minimum (why ask what I propose, then?) and walked away from the negotiation. YMMV. edit: checked my emails with them and edited for accuracy

_pius 18y ago
Great info, thanks a bunch.
asnyder 18y ago
My recent experience with Braintree was the opposite. I received an excellent offer from CHASE Paymentech and presented this to Braintree. They were willing to waive the monthly minimum and sent me a schedule of straightforward low rates, however, they still weren't as low as CHASE Paymentech. They even went so far as to say that I got a better deal with CHASE Paymentech and subtly suggested we use them until we felt we needed Braintree's value added services which seem to be the best in the industry.
- seanharper 18y ago
  Braintree seem like good people, I went to grad school with Brian and he is sharp and seems honest. I am really curious about how you compared the CHASE paymentech deal with the Braintree deal. Were they interchange-plus rates? Or were they qualified / midqualified / nonqualified? Did you know how the categories compared to each other? Disclaimer - I have a startup in the space (transfs) so this is market research for me. :)
maccman 18y ago
Braintree may have a high minimum monthly fee - but I don't think you should skimp on quality when it comes to a merchant/gateway account. Just try searching for competitors in Twitter - you'll quickly get a indication on the type of customer support they provide: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=authorize.net http://search.twitter.com/search?q=authorize.net So far I've found the people at Braintree to be friendly and extremely helpful. Also, if you don't see your business rising above the minimum monthly fee then it's probably not really worth your while. After your first 20 customers or so, you'll be paying exactly the same as most of the other gateways.
- ericb 18y ago
  It isn't a matter of not rising past the minimum monthly fee--it is a matter of the burn rate while ramping up when you're bootstrapping. Shortening the runway is a bad thing. If their sales person hadn't blown me off, I might have settled on them after looking around. As it was, I decided to hold off opening the account until we were farther down the road with development.

by ericb 18y ago

_pius 18y ago

Great info, thanks a bunch.

asnyder 18y ago

My recent experience with Braintree was the opposite. I received an excellent offer from CHASE Paymentech and presented this to Braintree. They were willing to waive the monthly minimum and sent me a schedule of straightforward low rates, however, they still weren't as low as CHASE Paymentech. They even went so far as to say that I got a better deal with CHASE Paymentech and subtly suggested we use them until we felt we needed Braintree's value added services which seem to be the best in the industry.

seanharper 18y ago
Braintree seem like good people, I went to grad school with Brian and he is sharp and seems honest. I am really curious about how you compared the CHASE paymentech deal with the Braintree deal. Were they interchange-plus rates? Or were they qualified / midqualified / nonqualified? Did you know how the categories compared to each other? Disclaimer - I have a startup in the space (transfs) so this is market research for me. :)

maccman 18y ago

Braintree may have a high minimum monthly fee - but I don't think you should skimp on quality when it comes to a merchant/gateway account. Just try searching for competitors in Twitter - you'll quickly get a indication on the type of customer support they provide: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=authorize.net http://search.twitter.com/search?q=authorize.net So far I've found the people at Braintree to be friendly and extremely helpful. Also, if you don't see your business rising above the minimum monthly fee then it's probably not really worth your while. After your first 20 customers or so, you'll be paying exactly the same as most of the other gateways.

ericb 18y ago
It isn't a matter of not rising past the minimum monthly fee--it is a matter of the burn rate while ramping up when you're bootstrapping. Shortening the runway is a bad thing. If their sales person hadn't blown me off, I might have settled on them after looking around. As it was, I decided to hold off opening the account until we were farther down the road with development.