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New Fee for MTs Accepting Credit/Debit Cards?

Hi everyone,

I don't get to this forum very often, but I've been surfing around on it today and noticed my previous reply to a discussion about whether or not to accept credit cards. I recommended Cellcharge, which I have used for the past 6 years, but noticed someone else recommending Charge America.

My question is this: Back in April, I received an email from Trustwave telling me that I needed to take a survey to become PCI compliant. I called Sage payments, the company Cellcharge partners with, and they confirmed my need to complete this survey.

Here's my problem: I never received a notice regarding the fee that I would incur by taking this survey. Sage states that they mailed them out with everyone's monthly statements prior to April, but as a Cellcharge merchant, I don't get mailed statements. Cellcharge depends on us using their "Virtual Reports" to access our statements ourselves. On a side note, I never even knew about that until I called Cellcharge in April to confirm what Sage told me.

When I accessed my online banking to look at my checking account, I noticed a withdrawal of $58.99, the normal $8.99/mth fee + $50 which once I called Sage, I learned was the fee charged to become PCI compliant.

Has anyone else who uses Cellcharge had a problem receiving communications from them or Sage and have you taken this survey too?

Does anyone using Charge America know if this is also something that they are doing, I was told it is required if you want to continue accepting credit cards, no matter what type of business you are.

I emailed Charge America to ask them about this, but would appreciate any input you all can give.

I am not dissatisfied with using Cellcharge, and will continue to accept credit/debit cards in my business, but have been dissatisfied with theirs and Sage's lack of communication with me to notify me of these types of things.

Thanks so much!

Exie

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Rachel McIntyre on June 7, 2010 at 7:55pm

Hi Exie,

I, too, use CellCharge to process my credit card payments. Like you, I was not notified of the $50.00 charge for meeting the new credit card processing compliance standards. I was busy reconciling my bank account when I saw the addition $50.00 charge. I receive paper statements as well as having access to My Virtual Reports on-line. I also keep all email notifications from CellCharge. I went back through all my data and nowhere was I given any information regarding the $50.00 fee. My statements did inform me that I would be subject to a $15.00 fine for each month I did not comply after July 1st however, there was no mention of the $50.00 fee. I was pretty outraged over this issue. I contacted CellCharge and they claim they sent out this information. What was further frustrating was not having any information regarding this compliance issue. Was this a one time fee or is this a new annual fee I can expect? I had to connect with a representative at Trustwave to get that answer. Yes, this will be a nice new annual charge we can expect to pay to be in compliance. CellCharge is not requesting this compliance. It is the bank owners of those credit cards that are imposing ALL merchants to comply. Think about all the places you can use your credit cards, now multiply that with $50.00. It's appalling how greedy the bank owners are with this new standard! Why should I have to pay any fee to meet their requirements? I spoke with an account manager at CellCharge regarding this matter and she admits that CellCharge does not agree with this new compliance standard but their hands are tied. If you want further information regarding PCI DSS Compliance, please read here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Payment_Card_Industry_Data_Security_St...
Perhaps this is an issue to bring to the attention of your U.S. Representative or Senator!

Rachel

Permalink Reply by Jessica Wilson on June 7, 2010 at 11:15pm

I do not use either company, however I do accept credit cards in my practice and have used 2 different credit card processing companies. Both companies charged me a one time PCI Compliance fee without ever telling me. One company even told me that they never had charged that fee in the past and didn't foresee them doing it in the future; to turn around and charge me. From my research it is now a standard fee for most businesses. Good luck.

Permalink Reply by Shawn Christie-Dunlap on June 8, 2010 at 12:42pm

Yep its true these companies want your money everyone has to be "pci" compliant....its just a another fee they can charge you and there is nothing we can do about it...it stinks!

Permalink Reply by CellCharge on June 22, 2010 at 12:07pm

Hi Guys,

Its Dave from CellCharge, I first want to apologize to those of you who did not receive anything regarding this PCI fee. We entrusted notification and communication to our processing bank, SAGE, who was supposed to send out both a letter in the mail, as well as an email to each of our merchants, but somehow not all of our merchants were contacted. I can assure you that I let them know how unacceptable that is and I am working with them to make sure that something like this never happens again.

This $50.00 fee has been instituted by the “payment card industry,” which is comprised of Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover and JCB. “PCI DSS” stands for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards. CellCharge has absolutely no control over this and we DO NOT make a single penny from the $50.00 annual fee. Unfortunately, we are at the mercy of PCI and interchange (the cost from Visa/MasterCard) so any time they increase rates or come up with some new B.S. fee, we have no option but to pass it down to the merchant.

The only good thing I can say about this is that the $50.00 fee is very low compared to what some other banks are charging. Last week I was sent a statement from an ABMP member from NJ who wanted me to see if I could save her money, on the statement she sent me it mentioned PCI DSS compliance and that she would be billed a $129.00 annual fee and I have heard that some banks are charging upwards to $200.00 annually and making it a profit center. My whole objective with CellCharge is to offer a cost effective and easy to use solution, but things like PCI make it really hard on businesses like yours and mine.

Again, I truly apologize for what has happened and will do whatever I can to make it up to you guys and assure you that CellCharge is not in the practice of just taking money from our merchants and it never will be!

Thank you for your time and hopefully your understanding!

Have a great day!

Dave Garboski
President
CellCharge Inc
866-735-5292

Permalink Reply by Rachel Sheard, LMT, NCTMB, CIPI on July 16, 2010 at 2:20pm

Maybe Dave has already cleared the air on this. I DO get paper statements from Cell Charge, which I sometimes pay more attention to that others...but I did catch this new thing in time to avoid anything other that the $50 charge. I did not get any other letter from Sage telling me about this, and get no emails from Cell Charge or Sage.

Rachel