What’s payment software and how will it grow your brand?

Online payment software is an integral aspect of e-commerce success. Integrating it into your website can increase the speed, and security, of customer transactions.

It’s an essential aspect of any e-commerce store and it can significantly help the growth of your brand—whether you’re local or going global.

To help you understand how it all works, we’ve got this guide to take you through the essentials and how FasterPay can assist your sales goals.

What’s a payment software service?

Payment software offers businesses with technology that enables B2C and B2B payments through automated solutions.

You may hear it described as a “global payment gateway”, which is what the software provides to merchants.

Businesses can use the software to accept, and manage, payments from B2B customers and when making them to your suppliers. As well as taking payments from their B2C customers.

How can customers pay online?

First up, let’s take a look at all the ways in which customers across the world can pay for goods and services. Their options include:

• Credit or debit card.
• eCheck and eCash.
• Mobile and in-app payments.
• Digital wallets.
• Prepaid cards.
• Merchant accounts.
• Buy now, pay later.
• Cash on delivery.
• Gift cards.

There are more options as well. But what are the most common payment methods? Predominantly, the most popular methods for customers are by credit or debit card.

But some of these options rely on an e-commerce site, payment gateway, and merchant account to ensure customers can complete transactions.

Here’s an overview of what they are and why they’re crucial to your business’ success.

What does payment gateway software do?

The provider acts as a mediator for banks and you—the merchant.

And it validates customer payment details. It does this in a secure way by encrypting data, which is sent across to the customer’s bank to ensure availability and validity.

Once the checks are complete, the transaction goes ahead and you receive the funds for a product or service.

Why use payment processing software?

It’s essential technology for businesses as online shopping becomes the norm.

Especially after the COVID-19 pandemic, more and more consumers are treating shopping across various devices as their preferred online payment methods.

And this means it’s crucial for your business to provide cutting edge payment methods that cater to a wide selection of customers.

In other words, you want to offer a fast and secure payment process that covers a variety of payment methods different customers will want to use.

Who uses payment processing software?

The software is a good investment for SMEs. Small and medium-sized businesses can use it to take their businesses to an international customer base.

Larger businesses can also do the same, of course.

In short, the software is ideal for any e-commerce business looking to streamline its payment processes or to scale up and provide cross-border payments.

How do online payments get processed?

With all the above software in mind, what’s the actual technical process behind it? This can broken into six stages:

1. A customer placing their order.
2. The customer paying.
3. A merchant web server processing the order.
4. The payment gateway validating the details.
5. The bank confirming everything.
6. Payment returning to the merchant.

For a technical analysis of how that works, here’s an explanation:

• One of your customers makes a purchase after adding a product to their basket and heading to checkout.
• Your payment gateway then has access to their personal data, which may include their address, name, and card number.
• The gateway takes that information and sends it to the acquiring bank.
• The bank sends the data to the card scheme in use and to the issuing bank.
• If that data is then validated based on the available records, the transaction is cleared.
• This approval is forwarded to the payment gateway and the transaction goes ahead.
• The customer completes their order and you receive payment.

It’s important to note all of this has to take place in a matter of seconds. It’s usually done within 10 seconds, often in as short as three.

That makes it a complex process but, thanks to modern technology, it’s achievable and streamlines your business’ checkout process.

What are online payment basics?

With the above in mind, what are the basics you as a business owner need to consider? It comes down to three areas:

1. You need an e-commerce platform—a website to showcase your business and its goods or services.
2. Having a payment processor will enable you to process credit and debit card payments, along with alternative payment methods.
3. You need a merchant account (or variation on it) to accept online payments. If you don’t have it, there’s nowhere for the money you make in transaction to go.

Three distinct areas and all equally important. But it’s arguably merchant accounts that cause the most confusion for businesses—especially startups.

With a merchant account, you don’t have access to the funds. But they do get automatically sent to your business bank account after 1-2 working days.

You can read our full guide to merchant services for more important information about this area.

FasterPay as a payment software solution

Now you know more about software solutions, let’s take a closer look at how we fit into the industry and what we provide to our customers.

What is FasterPay?

FasterPay provides users and merchants with a fast and secure payment platform,

And is FasterPay a payment processor? Or course, we supply the software that enables merchants to utilize a payment gateway.

This means transactions from your customers go through a complex process of verification and validation from your bank with FasterPay working as a mediator.

How does FasterPay work?

After you sign-up to FasterPay, you can use it as a digital wallet and also to supply your business with a payment processor.

And how can I add FasterPay to my website? You can easily integrate this into your checkout—without any coding experience. It’s simply a case of pasting HTML code into your site.

So, how do you get paid on FasterPay? Once it’s up and running then FasterPay simplifies payments for you and your customers.

We work as a mediator between your customer, their bank account, and your checkout.

In a matter of seconds, it processes transaction data by performing security checks and determining if the correct funds are in the customer’s bank account.

Once that’s cleared, the funds are then forwarded through to your bank account.

We have a full business guide to FasterPay to help you understand how our platform works for your brand.

Is FasterPay free?

It’s free to create a FasterPay account for business and user accounts. And it’s also free to download our app.

However, when you’re using our platform you will be charged for using our services. The price of this depends on where you are in the world. The charges are like this:

• US & Canada: 2.7% + 0.30 USD
• Europe: 2.7% + 0.30 EUR
• Russia: 3.5% + 0.30 USD
• Turkey: 3.5% + 0.30 USD
• Rest of the world: 3.9% + 0.30 USD

Is FasterPay safe?

FasterPay uses the latest security measures to ensure customer and merchant safety when sending and receiving money.

We have a full guide to our safety measures you can read here: Is FasterPay safe?

Don’t forget, we also have a 24/7 customer support team ready to help you if you need assistance with any payment related issues.

Payment processing software features

When you’re considering processing software, you’ll want to look for enterprise-level features that equip you with what you need to succeed.

So, what are they? The most common features and capabilities include:

• An integrated payment platform.
• Multichannel payments.
• Mobile payments support.
• Cost-effectiveness.
• Accessibility and simplicity.
• High standards of security.

Additional payment processing features can include the likes of:

• Offering a guest checkout for customers who don’t want to fully sign-up.
• Having a return and refund policy.
• E-invoicing solutions.
• Confirmation emails and other customer notifications.

All of the features, when combined, offer an e-commerce retailer to grow their business and match their customers needs.

Important trends related to payment processing software

Keep in mind it’s important to future-proof your business with new and evolving payment methods, which is why having payment software is important.

With it, you’re fully prepared to follow emerging and changing trends across the industry.

Some of the trends that’ll shape the future of payments include:

• An increase in the number of mobile payments.
• Buy now, pay later options—this is popular with younger generations.
• AI technology to step up anti-fraud systems and offer software that reconciles payments.
• An increase in the use of near field communication (NFC) and EMV—these reduce the liability of merchants with their top range security measures.
• The rise of cryptocurrency, which may become more of an accepted form of payment over the next decade.

Of course, new and exciting methods of payment may spring up in the years ahead as innovation in the digital era continues at a pace.

And as and when they happen, we’ll report on them here on the FasterPay blog.

Which all leads to the question—what advantages does this technology provide to businesses?

The benefits of payment processing software

You’ll no doubt have picked up a few of the benefits while reading this feature. But here are a few of the perks:

• Convenience: For you as a merchant and your customers. Making and receiving a payment is much more streamlined than with traditional methods.
• Better security: Online safety is improving all the time and the use of this processing software is a guaranteed way to maintain high standards.
• Growth options: Merchants now have an easy and fast way to offer their goods and services to customers all around the world.
• Scaling features: Whenever you need to scale up your payments with new methods and features, the software will help you do this.

Payment processing software is also cost-effective, so by investing in this technology you gain impressive ROI on a long-term basis.

Ultimately, it’s the sensible route for any e-commerce business looking to remain competitive in a rapidly expanding, and ever evolving, industry.

Ready to start using FasterPay?

Is FasterPay worth using? Of course, if you want to provide your customers with localized payment options over a fast and secure payment platform.

Setting up FasterPay is safe, secure, and ultra-fast. You can find the FasterPay pricing plans to see the charges involved. The app is available on:

• Google Play.
• App Store.

You can also create a desktop account, either a FasterPay personal or business account.

Any questions? We have our 24/7 customer support team: support@fasterpay.com.