i'm thinking of setting up an online store, and i think my heart's in the right place, just not my head.....granted, my stuff will be dirt cheap due to my lack of self-confidence, and i'll still be contributing to FreeStuff as i always have......here's the thing: after reading about the credit card theft at Egghead, and knowing that it happens more than we'd like to admit, i'd like to find another payment method....some, like myself, are absolutely paranoid about using a credit card online, whereas some don't mind at all.....there's something to be said for punching in your number and almost immediately getting what you're after......that's the beauty of this sort of thing......however, i was thinking of password-protected executables, with the password e-mailed upon receipt of a money order.......maybe i'm not thinking this thru, but it seemed good when i thought of it.....maybe i should just look into the R'osity store and be done with it, but i've read post after post about problems with downloads.....the only reason i want to set up a store in the first place is so that maybe, every now and then, i could have a little extra to spend on my chi'drens........they have such expensive habits for such little people ;) any response is appreciated..........btw, does anyone know if i have to have a business license of any sort other than the one i'd be required to obtain here in my city??????? is there some sort of e-commerce license one has to have????? ok.....i'm done now

You can (and probably should) use a merchant clearing service to handle credit cards. Otherwise fraud will eat you alive. The cost per transaction is high IIRC, but the alternative is worse. You sales will be small unless you take credit carss. There are few cases where I'm willing to go to the effort to get a money order and wait, particularly if I got the item by download. It just encourages cracking in my opinion. You could do something like only provide the item on a CDROM, but the cost of handeling that is high if your time is worth much. All things considered, I would suggest using Renderosity (or some other existing store) to start and see if you have something people will really pay for. The amount of labor involved in setting up a merchant site is very significant. You need to sell a lot of $10 textures (or whatever) to make up for 80 hours of time testing, coding, talking to the ISP, negotiating with the credit card service, arguing with tech support, etc. Just my opinion.

Welcome to hell kid. If you sell the product on cdrom, you can use a company like ccnow.com to handle credit card transactions. My friend and I are starting our own store soon and will be using check or money order at first, then when things get secure, we'll switch to a credit card service. Davo

A lot of people are using services like PayPal.Com. Check into it, they are international, handle all the risk, and VISA, MASTERCARD, wire the money directly into your bank account. Low fees, etc. How can you ask for more...?

credit cards are still the best way to go online even with the egghead scandel thingy it's really nothing for card members to be worried about. when using credit cards your protected from fraud, for one most credit cards will not bill you if you order something and the address your sending it to is not your current address on file. merchants need to verify that info first before the charge goes through. second if they do use your credit cart number you must have a matching exp date and if they have that info then it goes straight to the fraud department to get corrected more than likely the charge will be wrote off. needless to say with fraud charges that amount will stay as part of the balance because banks need a place to store that amount until the case is resolved which can take from 30-90 days but no intrest will accumulate on that charge. pretty much your more safe with credit than you are with any other form of payment i would say if you start up a store hire a company like ibill i do belive they only charge something like 6% of that balance which is alot cheaper than getting a merchant credit licance

You'd better call BBay and talk to them. They lost a lot of money through contested credit card billings...someone had stolen cc numbers and bought items through BBay. There are a lot of repercussions for the merchant...you lose your merchants account (and the money you thought you had). She's had software written to prevent a future occurrence of the same (she's very nice to talk to and VERY helpful). The merchant is definitely at a disadvantage as far as online credit card transactions.

I would have to agree with Fox and suggest you look into Pay-pal or Kagi (turn-key credit card processing accounts) before making a decision, Wolf. The sad reality is that, without credit card processing, you will indeed lose a lot of sales. I also would like to mention that, with cd-rom sales, the added waiting time and shipping costs will discourage a lot of customers, especially those who live in countries other than the U.S. Best of luck to you on your new enterprise!

heyas; i hate credit cards. :) i use kagi, and i like them very much. they DO take credit cards. they also take checks and money orders. not sure if they have any plans to hook up with paypal payments, but i am going to ask them. you don't need a merchant account with credit card companies to use kagi. they handle all that, you just pay them a very modest fee to do it. they have a new credit card security measurement now that uses the cards' security codes. i can't imagine why anybody would steal a credit card number, then go to bbay and go on a shopping spree. not that i doubt them.... people are strange, after all. i dunno, it just seems a credit card thief would hit some big name store and buy a buncha stuff they could sell for cash. :: :)

btw... if you really don't need the money (ie: to live on!) so badly, and you don't want the hassle of credit card payments and whatnots... why don't you broker your stuff through bbay, or vip, or here or wherever? instead of setting up your own store. well, it's your choice! :) and none of my business; but it's another thought.

I use regnow.com, they charge 20% but are reliable and pay promptly.

Paypal.com charges 1.9% on credit card charges, handles the whole deal and drops the money in my bank within a day or two. No Merchant Accounts, no VISA-Mastercard charge-backs, etc. I have also used Iescrow.Com for bigger deals and they also work fine. Anyone who hasn't used these companies isn't using modern, hassle-free technology. You can even put PayPal.Com butons on your website so that people can immediately use it, or sign-up (and you get $5 for it). If people can't "clear" the basic PayPal.Com sign-up info and get verified, they are probably weasels or deadbeats anyway. Why do people have to get ALL customers? Just have customers who are honest and pay as intended, and PayPal (and Iescrow) can check that...

If you're handy with HTML, the most professional way to go is to register a web-site, get a merchant's account & do all your charges through a large commercial cc processor. I use QuickCommerce. Keep in mind that the merchan't account can be paid off monthly & once it's all paid for, it can be sold like any other commodity. A paid for merchan't account is valuable property. The main advantages of a regular cc processing site are safety, extreme flexibility, immediate & precise means to do account reviews & the ability to easily & exactly do refunds, if necessary. I use QuickCommerce but also offer PayPal & Billpoint. I offer the latter two only because some customers prefer to stick with something they already know. But QC is without doubt the cheapest way for me & the funds are quickly deposited into my account. PayPal holds funds for several days (despite what they say!) because that's how they make money, using your liquid assets. My online charge feature is linked to my FileMaker Pro database of customers. If you have just a few items you're offering, it should be even easier than my business, because I have thousands of different (sometimes unique) items for which I must create a unique HTML link (though it takes me just a few seconds, because I've automated most of the process).

that's a lotta help ;) thanks to everyone who replied for the advice.........i'll refer to it 80 or 90 times before i make a final decision..........