Hi Guys,

Quick question - me and my wife live in Toronto Ontario, however, my wife is from Texas originaly, and has a texas SSN, address, DL, etc.

I'm wondering if it would be wise to register a business in texas under her name, in order to get a USD based merchant account.
Alternatively, perhaps we could just go across the border in bufallo and register an account over there with a bank.

I'm trying to setup a CDN merchant solutions - but i find the fee's high (mthly fee's), as well as the processors don't seem to accept AMEX.

What would you recommend in this instance?

Is it "complicating" it to much to setup everything as " USA based business" using my wife's information?


Thanks,
Andrew

It is fairly simple to set everything up as US based. You would more than likely be subject to some taxes though.

Most banks actually outsource merchant account processing to the merchant account providers. Chase is the largest processor last year has an alliance with First Data to offer merchant services. Plus some banks still do not understand the e-commerce side and would much rather deal with brick and mortar type of accounts.

Have you tried InternetSecure? They seem to have good service at reasonable rates. AmEx is a PITA regardless of where you are (just mho of course) :)

I have looked at internet secure - but can you integrate there payment gateway within your own site? They keep insisting i should settle with the user being directed to there site to complete a transaction.

It seems they offer something called Merchant Direct (http://www.internetsecure.com/solutions-integration.htm) as most electronic payment gateways have an API

Hey Corey -

Do you know how "difficult" it is to integrate something like "Merchant Direct" into a website? I.E..// my whole checkout is 1 simple form - no shopping cart, etc....

Is it something i can do "easily" - or does it involve programming?

ANdre.w

I have not sepcifically worked wiht that gateway unfortunately, but most gateways (like LinkPoint, Verisign's PayFlow, Authorizenet.com, etc) provide the code for you to integrate into your website.

You might call them and ask them for a test store number - some electronic payment gateways will give you one. Or you might look thru their site more and I am sure the code is somewhere on there (I would hope)