seanharper

8 ms·

31.
by seanharper 16y ago
There is no way that Cybersource + Wells Fargo is charging 1.45% for non-qual transactions. More likely they are doing something called Marking Up the Downgrades http://feefighters.com/blog/marking-up-the-downgrades/ where they quote a l
32.
Can Square make money with its new pricing?(quora.com)
26 points by seanharper 16y ago|4 comments
33.
by seanharper 16y ago
Yes it does cost them a lot less. The biggest expense Square faces is the interchange rate that it must pay to Visa/MC and they are much lower for swiped transactions.
34.
by seanharper 16y ago
Clarification -- as a gateway providers like Braintree, Linkpoint/FDGG, Auth.net, etc are perfectly fine, but their recurring functionality is not robust enough for most subscription or metered businesses. I must have written this before my
35.
by seanharper 16y ago
These results are very biased by the early-adopters that frequent hackernews. There are WAY more people out there are using the recurring functionality of the gateways (ex. Auth.net, Braintree, Linkpoint / First Data Global Gateway) than on
36.
by seanharper 16y ago
Excelerate is good, most of the companies have raised money as a result.
37.
by seanharper 16y ago
The recurring payments capabilities of gateways, such as Braintree, Auth.net, etc. typically are not as robust as the recurring payments capabilities of the companies that specifically focused on that capability such as Chargify, Recurly, Z
38.
by seanharper 16y ago
I think 30% discount to what you would take in the open market.
39.
by seanharper 16y ago
interchange is complicated!!
40.
Getting the Early Stage Job of Your Choice(transfs.com)
1 points by seanharper 16y ago|0 comments
41.
by seanharper 16y ago
SMARTASS! :) Fair enough - that is admittedly not at all mathematically correct and we should have chosen a different way to graphically show which side was "winning". You got us - questionable design decision.
42.
by seanharper 16y ago
I was one of the guys that wrote it - it's not BS - its just a random starting point. Most people play with the bars to try a few different scenarios.
43.
by seanharper 16y ago
I think lots of people are waiting and they have come up with a few versions of them. They have been silent for a while but rumors are that they are working on something awesome.
44.
by seanharper 16y ago
Probably. ;) The whole point of making these things is because they are fun to show off and potentially useful to other people. No sense in building something useful and not telling people about it.
45.
Square vs. Merchant Account Comparison Calculator(transfs.com)
54 points by seanharper 16y ago|19 comments
46.
by seanharper 16y ago
The average monthly fee (including gateway) on the transfs marketplace is $16 / month, which is included in the calculation (try putting the volume slider to $0). Likewise, Paypal Pro (which you need if you want to accept payment without
47.
by seanharper 16y ago
Yah, getting a merchant account is a pain in the butt, but I think you are overstating it a little. The jury is out on whether merchant accounts or paypal have more onerous reserves. There is a wide ecosystem of payment processors that lik
48.
by seanharper 16y ago
Actually its not misleading. That 1.9% interchange fee is a blended average of the interchange fees that an online business is likely to encounter, including debit (which is less than 1.9%), standard credit (less than 1.9%) and rewards (mo
49.
by seanharper 16y ago
This says "paypal upgrade calculator", which makes it sound more biased than it really is - it's actually a very fair comparison.
50.
by seanharper 16y ago
Chargify and Cheddargetter and Recurly are competitors and their products are pretty similar. I cannot speak to their specific benefits and disadvantages.
51.
by seanharper 16y ago
The issue that you describe where your prior merchant account provider billed you a downgrade rate for 90% of your transactions isn't really because they were "high-risk" (they weren't, you have no downgrades). It's an example of "marking
52.
by seanharper 16y ago
This is a shameless plug, but at http://transfs.com (transparent financial services) we have a free webservice that helps you compare various payments options. It's strictly private and requires no commitment of any kind. Basically it's l
53.
by seanharper 16y ago
I paid out the ass for my undergrad and graduate degrees, for neither was the primary benefit economic. What is the ROI on reading literature, or listening to music, or doing puzzles or making art? He is right, though, education has inflate
54.
by seanharper 16y ago
I would appreciate some evidence for whether that is actually true. Chicago and Milwaukee are both examples in the midwest for which that is not true - the east side is the nicest, very valuable waterfront property.
55.
by seanharper 16y ago
Why not just do an ACH transaction? ACH is problematic because it is not very secure, but for subscription software can be a good solution since there is no cost of goods.
56.
by seanharper 16y ago
Paypal has a pretty high per-item fee of 0.30 / transaction and a reasonably low (and fixed!!) percentage fee of 2.2%-2.9%. Therefore, if you have an abnormally large average transactions size OR get paid mostly by other businesses, with th
57.
by seanharper 16y ago
Offsite checkout has a bad reputation for decreasing conversion rate. It would be interesting to have a really scientific a/b test, but the results will also differ between different customer bases.
58.
by seanharper 16y ago
There are two philosophies: 1. Hire one provider, an expert, to handle everything for you - the merchant account, your billing logic (ex. recurring billing) and the payment gateway. 2. Get the best in breed for each layer in the stack. The
59.
by seanharper 17y ago
Supervise a computer lab, that was the best gig ever, i made $12 / hour (8 years ago) and could do homework and write code while I was working. It was a lot of fun too.
60.
by seanharper 17y 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 the

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