Looking at the current market scenario, it has become essential for businesses to tap into the colossal potential of the virtual world. However, in order to expand your business to the web, you need to go through a vigorous selection process of selecting a credible ecommerce services provider that offers a secure and flexible payment gateway to process online transactions. This write-up provides a comparative analysis of some major payment gateways in the international market, as well as in the Indian market.
Comparison of Top 4 International Payment Gateways
PayPal
PayPal, a wholly owned subsidy of eBay, is one of the world’s most popular payment gateway service providers. It links the merchant’s website to a processing network and merchant account. The company has clients in almost all parts of the world, and helps them to send and receive money in a swift manner. The services provided by the company have several advantages, such as personal data protection, ability to process payments in multiple currencies, etc. Non-US users are charged different amounts depending on the country. However, the biggest shortcoming of PayPal is the fact that it holds the right to freeze the user’s account at its will.
Authorize.Net
Authorize.Net is another popular payment gateway service based in the US. Serving approximately 350,000 clients within the US, the company enables merchants to consolidate, authorize and organize online, phone and mail orders transactions. Authorize is renowned for its efficient and seamless credit card processing services along with ease of software integration with popular ecommerce website platforms, such as x-cart, Magento, and Volusion, among others. However, sometimes its popularity attracts hackers and extortionists.
WorldPay
WorldPay has been offering credit card processing services since its inception in 1994, across The US. It allows the merchants to accept multi-currency payments and offer reasonable online payments solutions to suit every business needs. However, the disadvantages of using WorldPay are feeble fraud detection systems, and non-flexible ecommerce solutions.
Moneybookers
Moneybookers, rebranded as Skrill in 2012 is a UK based payment credit card processing service provider that enables merchants to accept 41 currencies across 200 countries. However, the provider has been surrounded with lots of controversies and negative merchant feedbacks owing to its random suspension of accounts without prior notification to account holders.
Charge.com
Charge.com is a one-stop destination for businesses looking for payment processing solutions. The company, with more than 15 years in credit card processing business, offers flexible ecommerce software solutions that are easy to integrate with websites. The advantage of the company is that it does not charge any set-up or application fees for its services, and provides round the clock free technical support. However, sometimes there are complains about the non-disclosure of complete financial details to the merchants, but this could be considered a matter of data security.
Payment Gateways in India
CCAvenue
CCAvenue is South Asia’s largest payment gateway service provider, currently processing online transactions for thousands of online merchants. It offers merchants a wide range of payment options including debit cards, credit cards, net banking, cash cards, mobile and mail order payments. However, the company has a number of unnecessary charges, and does not offer any flexibility to fit small and big business requirements that operate on a tight budget.
ICICI Payseal
ICICI bank, in collaboration with First Data (a credit card processing service provider), launched its own payment gateway known as ICICI Payseal in the year 2000. The benefit of this type of payment gateway is its reliability and fraud proof transactions, while its negative aspect is that it uses JSP script and can only be integrated with the servers that have the capability to execute JSP scripts.
HDFC Payment Gateway
HDFC Payment Gateway comes with detailed eligibility criteria that allow only businesses with minimum 6 months of experience or more to apply for the services. The benefit of such type of payment gateway is its flexibility to accept all major card payments. However, the downside is that it uses Java architecture, which could be annoying at times.
Pay U
Nasper (The South African multinational media company; the owner of ibibo) launched Pay U in 2011 in collaboration with a Chinese Tech Company, Tencent. The company offers online payment solutions at competitive prices and allows almost all major credit and debit card payments. This payment gateway is generally used by the sites like goibibo.com and tradus.com
Making Your Pick from the Options Available
In recent times, due to perpetual growth of ecommerce businesses, the demand for efficient and reliable payment gateway service providers has increased manifold. As a result, various new players have joined the battle, such as Citrus, SeedCore, and Atom, to name a few. In this write-up we have tried to provide you a comprehensive analysis of various international gateways along with comparative study of number of Indian payment gateways. However, apart from above mentioned gateways, there are various other payment gateways, available in the market, hence it is best to look at all possible options before picking the right one for your ecommerce endeavor.
