For a novice like me, selecting a payment gateway is confusing. You use Stripe. I decided on Simplify Commerce for no particular reason. Do you have any guidance as to what gateway is best/better?
Hi Janet,
Thanks for your question! Selcting a payment gateway normally depends on what gateways are available for your platform. Thankfully WooCommerce has hundreds of payment gateway options available so you're not limited in selection. With payment gateways you are looking for a low rate, good customer support, and how long it takes for the fund to be available to you.
On a marketplace I run I use Stripe and PayPal.
With Stripe the rate is 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction. Also, there is no monthly fee so if you don't have any transactions in a month you are not charged. You might be able to find a lower rate, but be sure to check for monthly and annual fees. Stripe offers customer support via email only, but each time I've contacted them they have replied quickly. Funds are in my business bank account 2 days after the order is placed. This setting can also be changed to do a 'sweep' of the account once per month.
In addition to credit cards I offer PayPal on the marketplace because some customers prefer using PayPal instead of their credit card. I think they feel it is an added layer of protection for them. The rate with PayPal varies depending on a few factors: is the customer using PayPal funds, is the customer domestic or international, does the customer have a verified PayPal account. It costs more in fees to accept PayPal, but 40% of customers select it while the remaining 60% use credit card. With PayPal funds are available in the PayPal account immediately, and a withdrawl to my business bank account takes 2 days to complete.
I also suggest merchants check with the bank they have their business accounts with. The banker might have a relationship with a payment gateway with special pricing.
Hope that helps!
Daniel
Yes, thank you. I did notice that you used Stripe and Pay Pal. I use Simplify Commerce and Pay Pal. It seems that Stripe and Simplify Commerce are about the same. If anyone uses Simplify Commerce, I would like to know the advantages and disadvantages. So far it is working fine for me.