Process Check Payments On your Shopping Cart

In addition to being able to accept credit cards from your customers, you will also want to be able to accept checks.  After all, the more forms of payment you can accept, the easier it will be for your customers to spend money on your products or services.

When it comes to accepting checks, the ACH payment method is preferred by many businesses.  The ACH, or Automated Clearing House, method allows you to process checks electronically in the same way you process credit cards.  In addition, with this method, the customer doesn’t even have to actually write a check.  This makes the ACH payment method even better when it comes to processing transactions through an online store.

In order to make electronic payments from their checking account rather than writing a check, your customers only need to enter their checking account numbers and their routing numbers into your system.  All of this information can be found at the bottom of the check and, once your customer inputs the information, it can be transmitted to your account within the next 24 or 48 hours.  This makes it possible for you to complete online transactions much faster since you don’t have to wait until you receive a customer’s check before sending out the product that has been ordered.

Another benefit to the this method is the fact that you can set up recurring payments with your customers.  If you provide a service, for example, you can set up an ACH credit payment structure that automatically deducts the regular fees from your customer’s account.  Many customers prefer this method because it saves them the hassle of writing a check each time a payment comes due.  In addition, this method is beneficial to your business because you do not have to worry about payments coming in late.

If a customer does write a check, you can still use this check payment processing method to convert the check into an electronic payment.  By doing so, you can actually process the check faster and get the funds into your account sooner. 

By using this method of payment, you can generally avoid having to pay additional fees commonly associated with check cashing.  Of course, if a customer doesn’t have the funds in his or her account, you will have to pay fees associated with bounced checks.  For this reason, it is still a good idea to have a bounced check policy in place. This way, you can pass the fees onto the customer if his or her check doesn’t go through.

The ACH credit method is particularly beneficial to small business owners because it makes it easier to keep track of customer payments.  Since you can view all of the ACH credits online, you don’t need to spend extra time with processing checks.  Once your business grows larger, using the automated clearing house system can save you money because you won’t have to hire someone to keep track of all of your accounts receivable and payable information.  Instead, you can simply check your online records, where all of the information has been recorded for you.

Getting Started Steps