Yahoo! Small Business

[cube3]

Anyone tried it out yet? Heard its good but a little pricy on the other hand. Many have said the features are good too. Care to share the experience or feedback/opinions people?

[Corey Bryant]

We have a few merchants using it. They do charge you for everything (which is what businesses should do) so be on the look out for that. Some of the merchants that we support are overseas and they have emailed me, asking me to call Yahoo from time to time to add a service on. I have done that and Yahoo has been most helpful, I will admit.

However, keep in mind that the price(s) you see, i.e. .5%, 1.0%, and 1.5% is the gateway (Yahoo's gateway fee) on top of what the merchant account provider (MAP) will charge you. Most gateways only charge a monthly fee (no transaction fee, no discount fee, etc). So do a spreadsheet, get all the prices, etc from them and compare. Can you beat / meet the competitors on Yahoo? If not, they might not be the way to go.

[cube3]

wait a min...r u running a merchant business? If so i can forgo using yahoo's paypal merchant and use yours instead? Are you trying to tell me that hehe because i am abit confused!

[Corey Bryant]

It get's even more confusing when it comes to Yahoo unfortunately. To somewhat answer your question, yes - you can use the services we offer in conjunction with Yahoo.

Basically to process credit cards, you need a merchant account (through a merchant account provider) and an electronic payment gateway (LinkPoint, Authorize.net, Payflow, Yahoo). What you get from Yahoo when you sign up with them is the gateway, hosting and a few other things as well. You can see here.

The merchant account provider that Yahoo partner's with is Chase / Paymentech. They use the First Data platform to process transaction, so any processor that is compatible with the First Data platform (like us since we are owned by First Data) will work on their gateway.

Yahoo Yahoo has three plans and it seems they raised their rates some (.75%, 1.0%, and 1.5%). This electronic payment gateway fee is applied to your transactions as well as fees imposed by the credit card processor (Chase / Paymentech or First Data / Cardservice). Most gateways will charge a monthly fee and some might charge a transaction rate (fixed fee) while a lot will not even charge a transaction fee. These transaction fees are usually imposed by the merchant account processor.

[cube3]

gosh i tot yahoo's merchant account was using PayPal's one?

[Corey Bryant]

Not really - if you look at this page, you will see

An easy application process to get either a merchant account with Chase Paymentech or a PayPal account, or both.

which is basically what most carts and a lot of people will suggest (including myself from time to time) - get a merchant account with an electronic payment gateway and sign up with Paypal (their P2P network).

[topout]

Fairly easy to use but they charge for everything.

Take a look at amazon's services, it's a new service and might work better for you.