This is something that has come up more times than I can care to think about...

What is the best Payment Gateway / Billing script combo out there? What do you use, and how do you like it? What do you wish it could do, if you think its missing something...

(Gateway Example: AuthorizeNet)
(Billing Script Example: Clientexec)

There isn't a right or wrong answer, as everyone has something that works for them. Others want something simple and others want the motherload.

Let everyone know!

We have used them all and whole exclusively use Netbilling (netbilling.com) for all of our applications and for all of our clinet referrals as well. They handle our call cneter services too.

NOBODY is better IMHO.

Netbilling has my approval stamp. Great for ACH accounts!

Anyone else want to be more specific than "them all?" Id like to see some specifically posted.

Some of the big guys right now like EPN, AuthorizeNet, E-Pay, Linkpoint, Skipjack Financial, Fastcharge, and so on.. Whats your experience with these gateways guys?

Especially the Biggest 2 listed, E Processing Network, and AuthorizeNet. Which do you prefer?

We use LinkPoint with Cardservice. We have been very pleased with their services. And I just handcoded a simple billing program using their API, it was a lot easier than using authorize.net's method.

I was checking out Netbilling but someone on these forums pointed out that the Netbilling gateway was not listed on the List of Compliant Service Providers (http://usa.visa.com/download/business/accepting_visa/ops_risk_management/cisp_List_of_CISP_Compliant_Service_Providers.pdf), so I decided to choose another gateway. I tried to call Netbilling a few times to ask them if they used another name on that list but I always received the run-around.

I love the linkpoint gateway.... Its simple, but I didnt like having to remember store codes. 'whew'

AuthorizeNet has become one of those commodities. They were the first, and will probably be the last. I completely understand from that stand point. EPN took some of that simplicity, added some robust features to advanced recurring, and then for manually entering merchants, added free basic recurring, which use everyday.

Netbilling. Well Ill have to msg you on that.

CyberSource probably has the best infrastructure and redundancy, and the costs are actually pretty reasonable if you're a higher volume merchant.

The best script? That's easy...the one we developed inhouse. :)

Kidding aside, we decided to look into a payment processor failover mechanism after one of our clients experienced a decent-sized loss of revenue from the Authorize.Net DDoS situation last year. So we created an extension to our inhouse Java e-commerce framework that can failover to another gateway if necessary. We send test transactions at specific intervals (generally every 1 - 5 minutes), and if there is an error on the primary gateway we elevate the secondary gateway to be the primary and send the transaction again. Meanwhile we're stilling attempting to send test transactions to the downed gateway, and if it successfully passes a certain number of successive attempts it gets reintroduced as the primary gateway again. We also developed a scheduling component (using the nifty open source Quartz component), so if you know your primary gateway will be having downtime from scheduled maintenance, you can enter that information and it will automatically switch to the secondary gateway during that time period. We abstracted the processor specific information (URLs, field mappings, response codes, etc.) to XML files so we can plug in various processors without too much hassle, though we primarily deal with CyberSource, Verisign & Authorize.Net (we do have one client that uses SkipJack as their primary processor). That part was fairly straightforward, though we did have to update some of the business logic in other areas of the application for things like refunds to make sure the right gateway is used.

For one technically there is no "Best solution" it varies upon the application(s) needed (as far as panel integration etc and so on). We've however been running:
Billing/helpdesk panel: Clientexec
Merchant Gateway: authorize.net (with mc/visa/amex support enabled)
Additional gateways: paypal, stormpay

In any case the above solution has worked quite well for the entire time we have been using it since it was implimented.

-Justin

Originally posted by aci-john
Netbilling. Well Ill have to msg you on that.
You did not answer my question in the private message. You offered me a service which I thought was inappropriate. Some might even say that was spam.

*rolls eyes*

I answered the question. Netbilling is proprietary.

They offer it with ther services only. It has an ACH or credit card processing module that you use with their service. The rates on ACH are the lowest ive seen without going directly to a bank. The credit card processing rates are much higher though.

We use hsphere and its integrated billing solution with the psigate gateway/merchant account and the paradata gateway/paymentech merchant account (1 for each business, but, both run through hsphere :) )

Originally posted by aci-john
*rolls eyes*

I answered the question. Netbilling is proprietary.

They offer it with ther services only. It has an ACH or credit card processing module that you use with their service. The rates on ACH are the lowest ive seen without going directly to a bank. The credit card processing rates are much higher though.
That still does not explain anything. Proprietary or not, it is my understanding that all gateways should be CISP compliant or it might be another Cardsystems incident

Hi,

For the merchant account and payment gateway we use Authorize.Net/Wells Fargo IPS. We wrote our own system in PHP/MySQL based on our Lampshade LAMP framework that bills hosting clients down to the second. (Judging by how dissatisfied most people on these boards seem to be with their billing systems, maybe we should commercialize and distribute it...)

Aaron

Originally posted by thinkcomp
Hi,

For the merchant account and payment gateway we use Authorize.Net/Wells Fargo IPS. We wrote our own system in PHP/MySQL based on our Lampshade LAMP framework that bills hosting clients down to the second. (Judging by how dissatisfied most people on these boards seem to be with their billing systems, maybe we should commercialize and distribute it...)

Aaron

If this is for cpanel - Im sure there will be a large demand for it - but, this functionality already exists by default in hsphere..