I am starting an online social site for people to meet each other
(services) and I want to be able to accept credit card payments
online. (I think that business is viewed as risky by most ISOs out
there - true ?)

My monthly volumes as you might expect will be negligible in the first
12-18 months (is my guess). Maybe $$500 per month (???) - no idea
there..

I want you to do the research for me by calling or communicating with
some of the more reputable companies out there (Worldpay,
Authorizenet, Cybercash..etc) and let me know what the MOST cost
effective solution is for me. I do not want to deal with any companies
with questionable integrity.

How many people do I need to pay: gateways, merchant accounts,
shopping carts, credit card clearing..etc??? can you detail costs for
each? Does any one provider provide ALL ? what is more cost effective.
shopping around for those pieces or going with one provider? please
show me the numbers!

Please provide a clear summary at the end telling me my BEST option
today (after all expenses, discounts, one time fees, 'per transaction'
fees, monthly fees..etc.)

Please be clear/crisp and comprehensive - I am not much of a techie. I
am not looking just for links to read. I need research into each of
the providers you think of as reputable and all their fees and what
you think is best for a site like mine inthe summary. (in other words,
what would you do if it was your site)

Thanks

I've used Authorize.net for over 6 years, and it seems they always
come up with new ways to irritate me. Over the years, they have forced
protocol changes, increased my fees several-fold, started sending out
emails to my customers without notifying me, made changes to their
system that proved to be incompatible with mine--in the middle of the
night and without notifcation to me, failed to provide useful
assistance when I really needed it, etc. etc. The only reason I'm
still with them is because I don't want to go through the substantial
hassle of switching providers.

I would say that paypal would most certainly be the most cost
effective solution, although it may turn some people off. You are
unlikely to find a better discount rate than paypal offers for a
service of your type in the first few years.

tisme-ga

alexander-ga: thanks for your comment. Not sure I want to use
Authorizenet anymnore. I heard the Verisign has a good service but
pricey.

tisme-ga: I thought about Paypal. It is one possibility. Thanks

Hello,
I researched about this topic and I identified  2 problems :
Payment processor and the shopping cart software if your are selling
several types of subscriptions etc. Several payment processors offer
also shopping cart buttons to their customers so sometimes it is not
necessary to install a shopping cart software. Several shopping cart
softwares integrate with payment processor and gateways and makes the
integration very easy.

Hope this helps.