Starting an e-commerce front in the UK

which product set to use?

[barbican]

(hello, longtime lurker here)

I sell my art prints in the UK, generally over Paypal (yuk) or check-in-post, and have a successful website in terms of traffic and interest but no payment engine. I do not expect to sell high volumes, maybe only 1-2 orders a week though it could become 1 or 2 a day. I have developed the os-commerce front end, thats no problem. The bit I am missing is complete comprehension of what I must do to get everything online, and if it is worth it, and trawling all the archives hasn't completed my education!

I want to accept credit cards, so what do I need to get? From what I can tell, 1st option is I should apply for WorldPay 'WorldDirect' and be done with it, but I can't find enough in these forums that is a sanity check. 2nd option is I have a successful offline business managed by Barclays which will eventually receive the funds anyway, so perhaps that is a route. 3rd option is 2checkout, I suppose.

Any advice gratefully received:)

[Fighting Falcon]

As a Barclays customer, have you considered their epdq facility? Most of the major shopping carts do support them. If you already have a merchant account from Barclays you could go for anyone of the UK based processors such as Protx, Worldppay, Secpay etc.

Also if you already have a customer base using paypal then it might be worth keeping it running alongside whoever else you choose. Paypal is fine once you get past the initial sign-up process.

FF

[barbican]

I'll definitely look more into EPDQ but at first glance it seems about twice the cost of worldpay.. thanks for the thought

[GarryBoyd]

If you already have an offline business, and a small volume online, why not just process manually thru a merchant account?
I take orders via phone, mail, zip zap machine and internet, using Mals checkout.
Couple of hundred $ to set up, small minmum monthly and a zero floor limit. I just get an authorisation by touchtone phone for each transaction.
If you have a storefront, then get a terminal pinpad.
Its very simple and quick enough for a low volume when you actually ship goods.
Also, if you are out of stock, you don't charge the card before you ship, whereas online processors will charge the card when the order is placed, causing hassles if there is a delay.

[WibbleWobble]

f you already have an offline business, and a small volume online, why not just process manually thru a merchant account?

From the initial post, I'd suggest this is unlikely, but it remains a vaild point -- a hardware terminal is always an option if you have one, can get one, or forsee needing one eventually.

Also, if you are out of stock, you don't charge the card before you ship, whereas online processors will charge the card when the order is placed, causing hassles if there is a delay.

I know that a number of merchant PSPs allow payments to be held in limbo, until you choose to release (charge) them, for that exact reason.