Best online payment system

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Hi,
My company needs a online payment system - we will be handling on average jobs of around £1200. We will be taking a commission from this and then passing the rest of the money on again.

Does anyone know the best system to use for our requirements ?

thanks
 
Do you want it automated? E.g money comes in your cut is calculated and deducted then the final amount is transfered to the third party automatically?

We talking a payment gateway or full e commerce system?


Mobile or web or both?

What's average monthly gross?

There's so much to it just saying you want one doesnt really cut it.
 
Do you want it automated? E.g money comes in your cut is calculated and deducted then the final amount is transfered to the third party automatically?

We talking a payment gateway or full e commerce system?


Mobile or web or both?

What's average monthly gross?

There's so much to it just saying you want one doesnt really cut it.

Im new to this so sorry for being so vague - in answer to your questions

We would want the system to be automated
We would want it initally to be web based but obviously mobile in the future
Average monthly gross is £30000
 
the company is www.thebuildersnetwork.co.uk however we are currently having a complete revamp and for the new website we are going to be putting builders and customers in touch with each other with complete transparency. However for the jobs that builders get through us we will be taking the customers payment - holding onto it in escrow - taking our commission - and then sending it onto the builder.

Obviously want as small a commission as possible

yeah, your probably going to have some issues with that sort of setup, by taking the payment yourself you technically become the merchant of record for that payment and as such become responsible for the good / services that are being provided...

You'd be much better off facilitating the payment and taking a cut either by splitting that payment or invoicing the builder yourself.

Honestly PayPal might be worth a look, purely because their Split and Chained payments APIs would allow you to setup such a payment...

Personally i'd look at a different way of monetizing your service, the payments side will be pretty hard to do in a way that everyone accepts, maybe offer options and integrate to someone like cybersource, then charge a monthly fee to use said integration.


*source - i'm an ex online payments sales engineer with 5years experience helping people do similar things :)
 
I agree with silconslave on this one.

Paypal is the best option in my mind as they seem to offer the cheapest rates at that level (1.9% and 20p per transaction).

By operating in escrow you leave yourself open to law suits from both sides bit of a dangerous area.
 
yeah, your probably going to have some issues with that sort of setup, by taking the payment yourself you technically become the merchant of record for that payment and as such become responsible for the good / services that are being provided...

You'd be much better off facilitating the payment and taking a cut either by splitting that payment or invoicing the builder yourself.

Honestly PayPal might be worth a look, purely because their Split and Chained payments APIs would allow you to setup such a payment...

Personally i'd look at a different way of monetizing your service, the payments side will be pretty hard to do in a way that everyone accepts, maybe offer options and integrate to someone like cybersource, then charge a monthly fee to use said integration.


*source - i'm an ex online payments sales engineer with 5years experience helping people do similar things :)

could he put a term in his T&Cs that says they arent liable for the goods/services done?
 
so with the paypal option would we be able to tell paypal that we want them to take say 6% commission and they would take that from the customer and then pass it onto the builder . We would then take our money from paypal minus their commission.

Escrow seems like it is slightly dodgy and we wouldnt necessarily want to be liable for all the building work that goes on ??
 
so with the paypal option would we be able to tell paypal that we want them to take say 6% commission and they would take that from the customer and then pass it onto the builder . We would then take our money from paypal minus their commission.

Escrow seems like it is slightly dodgy and we wouldnt necessarily want to be liable for all the building work that goes on ??

It would require server side scripts. Paypal sends confirmations once its recieved payment, once that's been recieved the script would then calculate your commission based on what's left after paypal fees and you could most likely set it up to payout automatically from paypal to the builders minus commission and paypal fees. However the builder would most likely be hit with a few as well on transfer.

(Edit: that's to my knowledge there may be another way).

This system would require both customers and builders to sign up for accounts with you. I believe because you'd be storing payment details (although paypal details) you'd have to abide by the pci.

Unfortunately it isn't ideal and if you're grossing 30k PCM then it might be worth handling the payments by hand. Even if you set aside an hour a day to do it.

Quick query though. Is that an estimated 30,000?
 
Last edited:
It would require server side scripts. Paypal sends confirmations once its recieved payment, once that's been recieved the script would then calculate your commission based on what's left after paypal fees and you could most likely set it up to payout automatically from paypal to the builders minus commission and paypal fees. However the builder would most likely be hit with a few as well on transfer.

(Edit: that's to my knowledge there may be another way).

you can do it through PayPal's adaptive payments: https://developer.paypal.com/docs/classic/adaptive-payments/integration-guide/APIntro/ using either split or chained payments (split the buyer can see your comission, chained they can't)

This system would require both customers and builders to sign up for accounts with you. I believe because you'd be storing payment details (although paypal details) you'd have to abide by the pci.

The buyer wouldn't need an account, they'd just be paying the builder, who would need one.

You wouldn't need PCI compliance though as you're not actually touching the payment card details, just payment tokens.
 
see below

It would require server side scripts. Paypal sends confirmations once its recieved payment, once that's been recieved the script would then calculate your commission based on what's left after paypal fees and you could most likely set it up to payout automatically from paypal to the builders minus commission and paypal fees. However the builder would most likely be hit with a few as well on transfer.

(Edit: that's to my knowledge there may be another way).

This system would require both customers and builders to sign up for accounts with you. I believe because you'd be storing payment details (although paypal details) you'd have to abide by the pci.

Unfortunately it isn't ideal and if you're grossing 30k PCM then it might be worth handling the payments by hand. Even if you set aside an hour a day to do it.

Quick query though. Is that an estimated 30,000?

With our current system it is around £30000.
at the moment we are taking bookings for the jobs giving the job to one of our builders and taking our (larger) commission.(and being responsible for them)
 
you can do it through PayPal's adaptive payments: https://developer.paypal.com/docs/classic/adaptive-payments/integration-guide/APIntro/ using either split or chained payments (split the buyer can see your comission, chained they can't)



The buyer wouldn't need an account, they'd just be paying the builder, who would need one.

You wouldn't need PCI compliance though as you're not actually touching the payment card details, just payment tokens.

Thanks for clearing that up :)
 
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