Wholesale Clubs Are Sometimes Better!

Payment processing, more specifically credit card processing, is one of the most confusing and complex services that business buy today. OPC or Optimized Payment Consulting (an Atlanta, Ga.-based consulting firm recognized for helping business reduce credit card processing costs through its payments expertise and proprietary software), provided a new research paper compares the values which is offered by each of the clubs and highlights the strength and weakness of purchasing merchant services from whole sale clubs.

This new OPC’s research paper helps the merchants in understanding the value of buying credit card processing services from a Wholesale Clubs such as BJs, Costco, and Sam's Club. Though the top seven merchant acquirers processed over ninety per cent of the U.S. Visa and MasterCard credit and debit sales in the year 2007, there are thousands of resellers and referral companies. he BJ's, Costco and Sam's are the wholesale clubs that provide fantastic value when you want to buy in bulk, but are they competitive enough when you are buying credit card processing services for your own business?

It is possible for the merchants to get competitive rates for their credit card processing business when the competitive nature of the payment processing is known. It is very confusing and one can easily get lost and taken in by the teasing rates and complex rate structures. The Wall Street Journal in August 2007 noted an article titled, "Charge It!” "Navigating the payment-card processing system can be an overwhelming and costly burden." Moreover the owners of small enterprises can easily take advantage of this facility as it helps them save up cash as they buy their office equipment and furniture.

The merchants from the wholesale clubs can expect reasonable and comparable level of service. This is because they offer standardized pricing to all its members and is aligned with some of the largest processors in the United States. So how do these clubs manage to stack up when it comes to price and overall value? That's a complex question that Optimized Payments has tried to answer through its research and analysis.

Wholesale clubs have significant shortcomings when taken collectively because of their single program, which has to fit in all. Individually they have certain strengths also. But only a certain group of merchant with specific profile as noted on the research paper will gain more from these Wholesale clubs as it was explained by Optimized Payments Consulting founder, Anand Goel.

There is a tough competition among the three Whole sale Clubs that is the BJ’s, Costco and the Sam’s. So the Comparison among Merchant Services programs is not an easy job as the BJ's and Costco seem to have the most competitive offering, with Sam's not too far behind. All the Wholesale Clubs offer reasonable levels of service, which is backed by the largest processors in the industry. However, all these offerings become less competitive for the middle to large-sized merchants.

Goel said that a good due diligence can save merchant’s tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars per year on credit card processing services. And that's crucial in this economic environment. People should be aware of the criminals and the retail sector will help to educate public along those lines.

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