CC charges (if any) between USA and UK

UK company taking US CC payments

[Rusty]

Hi folks, wonder if you can help. If we, a UK company, take credit card payments from people in the USA where (if any) are charges applied and who picks them up?

eg. our price is £50 UK pounds, we take cc details on our machine and receive £50 UK pounds in our account. What happens to the US customer? do they get charged the simple dollar equivalent of £50 UK pounds or is there a charge levied by our/their bank or the cc company.

I guess individual banks have differing rules but in general, does anyone have any experience of this?

NB. the transaction involves no goods or shipping.

If there are any existing threads on this (I looked but couldn't see any) please feel free to direct me :)

Many thanks.

[Macro]

You get your 50 quid. Your Merchant Services will invoice you as usual at the end of the month at the agreed rate for that type of card. Where the card was issued doesn't make a difference. You don't pay for currency conversion, the customer does. He will see $86.23 or $130.55 on his statement depending on what his agreement with his card issuer is ... and, of course, the currency rate they apply to the transaction.

He can still cancel the transaction and/or ask his bank to start chargeback proceedings just like a UK customer could.

[Shak]

Your US customer will probably end up paying more, not sure of the exact working though (sorry)

If you are gonna do a lot of business, well worth getting a US $ merchant account aswell.

nothing worse than your customer getting overchaged and thinking it was YOU and not the CC company/bank etc

Shak

[Macro]

... and what Shak said.

[Leosghost]

This depends entirely on who you have handling your payments ...into your site at on end ..after that it depends on the issuing bank of the credit card ...I pay in dollars from an account in euros ..when I get back my statements ..I always have a charge of 1 euro added onto whatever the conversion rate was at the time of purchase ( give or take a few hours )...
If I sell something for 10 dollars then I get 10 dollars or equivalent less the cc handling companies percentage ..as there is acharge per trnsaction in my bank of one euro whatever the total was ..I choose to be paid periodically ..this involves risk of chargebacks fraud etc ..how ever I am selling shipable goods ...if you are selling downloadables you have bigger risk today ..mine is bigger tomorrow ..

I nearly understood myself there... ; )

[Rusty]

Thanks folks. Hmm, looks like we need to set something up whereby the US customer (or someone paying in Euros or yen) doesn't get the licked end of the lollipop.

Cheers.

[Leosghost]

do they get charged the simple dollar equivalent of £50 UK pounds

this would involve banks working for free ...and then we would all wake up go downstairs and eat our cornflakes : )

[Macro]

statement depending on what his agreement with his card issuer is ... and, of course, the currency rate they apply to the transaction

Leosghost, that was meant to cover charges as well ;)

This depends entirely on who you have handling your

Based on his description it sounds like the handling is done by Barclays Merchant Services or similar UK merchant services.

[Leosghost]

Hi Macro ..my confusion was .. you posted while I was typing ...do I type slow on this "azerty" keyboard or what!

[Macro]

do I type slow on this "azerty" keyboard or what

<sigh> Why doesn't everyone just use "proper" UK keyboards? ;)

[Leosghost]

Cos they don't sell them here ..And if you could see the exagerated prices for the software that is on sale ..the delays compared to the "real world" before we have certain software ..and best of all the "translations" of all software ( even 'doze helpfiles )..that is done by supposedly qualified translators ...rant rant .....
Even to return to topic ( see I can ) credit card handling ..ever seen a paypal landing page in French ..doesnt exist! All the official govt and media tell everyone all the time that paying with cc on the net is "tres tres dangereuse" ...
and wait for it ..one yes one company hasthe national monopoly on the rental and or sales of the credit card machines ...every time you shop anywhere here you put your card in one of their machines ..and if you want to receive cc via your site ..you gotta go through them ...
they are reasonably priced ..the problem is they wont deal with you unless you have adeal with your bank which says you can "distance sell " ( vente par correspondence ) ...your bank will only issue this if you are able to supply them with your business registration docs which must be less than 3 months old ...
When you register a business here of any sort you are contacted usually within 3 weeks and required to pay "upfront" 6 months health and retirement contributions ( "stamps" to those in the UK ) ...these are assessed ..( cos you didn't make any money yet ..but thats not important! ) the assessment is usually at around $8000 or $5000 or €6000 per year ...if you dont /cant pay they'll take your bank account /house /car /furniture whatever ...and all this before you even hear from your first customer!
If it turns out that at the end of year you actually made some money then they will reassess you for next year ..and you will pay 56% of your net profit in "contributions "..again "up front" ....

So when I take your credit card ....this is what I got to go through just to propose you the widget ...

the reason that all the widgets except food and houses are so damned expensive here is that whoever makes any money in their own business has no choice but to give over 50% of what they make to the state ...

Then of corse we do have nearly 7 million civil servants to pay for ....

[Macro]

If it's any consolation Gordon Brown's paying the wages of over 40% of UK workforce! And I'm partly responsible for financing Gordon Brown.