A merchant account is what allows businesses to accept credit cards as a form of payment on purchases made online, over the phone, or in person at a brick-and-mortar establishment. Merchant accounts are fully backed by a financial institution, and account sales are typically posted the merchant's checking account within 24 – 48 hours of a transaction.
As a full-service payment processing provider, CardMax can give most businesses processing for all credit card types. These cards include Visa®, MasterCard®, American Express®, Discover® Network, Carte Blanche, debit cards, ATM cards, EBT cards, gift cards and ACH/check services.
Having a payment gateway is what allows you to process transactions securely in card-not-present environments. The payment gateway is a third-party service that acts as a vehicle to carry ecommerce transactions to the payment processor for authorization. It allows you to offer a safe and secure way for your customers to buy from you online or over the phone. CardMax offers merchants more than five gateway options to choose from.
On average it takes two business days to get approved for a card-not-present merchant account, for our retail merchants, however, it can be as quick as a few hours. Timing is dependent up complete applications and underwriting packages, as well as answering any questions that arise during the underwriting process.
For our US merchant accounts, most deposits will hit the checking account within 48 to 72 hours from the time the transaction takes place. International merchants sometimes receive a longer deposit time, but it is dependent upon business type.
AVS is built into the sales and authorization process to help prevent fraud in card-not-present transactions. It is a system used to verify the address of a person claiming to own the credit card that they are using. The system will check the billing address of the credit card provided by the user with the address on file at the credit card company. A response code is sent back either approving or declining the transaction based upon whether or not the information on file matches the information provided.