Many online merchants provide products and services, which require customers to make upfront deposits. You’ll know this well if you’re running a B&B, taking restaurant bookings, or creating bespoke products such as cakes and artwork.
However, this can often seem complicated for both parties involved. Merchants want to ensure that deposits are paid on time and that transactions can be handled quickly, whilst customers want to ensure that their deposits are protected and can be made in a secure manner.
Luckily, thanks to a handful of brilliant online payment services, taking deposits online is now easier than ever before. Along with having a facility of a gaming merchant account, there are numerous other payment methods that websites are implementing.
Read on to find out more about three great payment methods you can offer on your website, which make placing a deposit a simple affair for both you and your customers.
PayPal
PayPal is an online payment giant, which means the service is both trusted and accessible. By offering your customers the option of placing a deposit via PayPal, you make the process easy for them.
This is because the PayPal system is both efficient and secure. Moreover, most online shoppers will already have a PayPal account.
PayPal is also beneficial for you as the service is free at the point of use. You don’t need to pay any annual or monthly service fees to offer PayPal payments on your website.
Instead, the e-wallet will simply take a cut when you do make a sale. This is perfect for those merchants who can’t be sure they’ll always have a steady customer base.
Credit Card
If you already accept payments for products via credit card, then taking deposits via credit card too makes sense. As a merchant it means you don’t need to add another payment method to your website, saving you both time and money.
Credit card deposits also ensure that your customers feel protected. Under ‘Section 75’ of the Consumer Credit Act, the credit card company has equal responsibility with you if there’s a problem with the finished product. As such, customers can rest assured that there’s legal recourse should anything go wrong.
Moreover, credit card deposits are perfect for high-risk services, such as car rentals or holiday home rentals. In these cases, repair bills may end up being much larger than the original deposit and so you need to know that you can charge these to somewhere else.
With a credit card on file, you can simply charge the costs to the credit card and leave the customer to deal with paying it back.
Pay by Phone
If you only need to take small deposits from customers (less than £30), then pay by phone bill deposits may be your friend.
These kinds of payments allow customers to pay using their phone number, and the transaction will simply be added on to their monthly phone bill.
These kinds of deposits can be reassuring for your customers, as they needn’t share their banking details with you, and allow for your customers to essentially borrow money until their phone bill comes through.
For you, pay by phone deposits are beneficial as they can be handled incredibly quickly. Pay by phone transactions can be completed in a matter of seconds, which means you don’t need to worry about waiting for the payment to come through before providing a service.