We're looking at switching merchant accounts, and are having trouble finding a good way to "shop" what's out there. All the sites we've found are sites built around some merchant processor's affiliate program. In other words, biased.

So, here's what we've got:

Average ticket: $30
Monthly CC Volume:5 figures

One of the things I hate are these contract terms. They all want to lock you in and then auto renew your contract.

Also, we'll want to use Authorize.net as the gateway.

Recommendations?

It seems like you are in the United States since you are wanting to use Authorizenet.com's gateway? Even though some international clients can use that gateway, for the most part it is for United States merchants.

Having said that, your choices are pretty good - there are hundreds of ISOs to choose from basically and most are compatible with that electronic payment gateway.

You will probably lose a little money by using that gateway since they charge you for transaction fees while usually you are not charged by the gateway for transactions.

Even with the contracts, renewing them is sometimes harder plus getting a long term contract helps to lock you into lower rates when Visa / MasterCard raises theirs. The provider needs to contact you to let you know. There are some that have no contracts and some are 6-months, while if you even sign up for longer terms, you get a lower discount rate. One thing to think about is - why would you change? Why are you wanting to change now? What is it about them that you are not happy with? That will help us to help you out more.

With the processing volume you plan to do and your average ticket you should be easily accepted by most processors assuming your products/services are not very high risk. This means if you spend some time to shop around you should be rewarded with excellent rates.

Authorize.net is supported by virtually every single processor so if that is the gateway you have chosen to use, and most Internet accounts do choose Authnet, then you should be fine. Once again, virtually every merchant account provider offers Authnet so this shouldn't be much of a factor in your search.

As far as the contract gores, stear clear of any contract that locks you in for any length of time or auto-renews itself. These kinds of contracts are completely unnecessary and don't offer you any benefits. If a merchant account provider is telling you that you can get lower rates by being locked into a contract ask them why you can't get those same rates without a contract? Visa and MasterCard don't tie their rates to contracts and neither should that provider. There are plenty of merchant account providers that offer excellent rates without locking you into a contract.

Not being locked into a contract forces your provider to give you excellent service as they know you can leave them at any time if they treat you poorly. Although it is not common for that to happen, there's peace of mind in knowing you have that leverage. Plus it just sucks knowing that if something comes up and you have to close the account you don't have some huge fee hanging over your head.

As I did point out on the other thread (http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=176785), CDG is one that I know of that has no contract so that might be one consideration.

vantagecard.com has no contract and has interchange+ rates. I would have switched to them a few months ago, but Wells Fargo matched their rate so it made it less of a hassle to not switch. You will probably find it hard to get some of the big companies to give you interchange+ if you are not doing $100,000 in Visa/Mastercard each month.

There is a good web site about merchant accounts - http://www.merchant-account-services.org (http://www.merchant-account-services.org/). You can find a lot of information there about merchant accounts, shopping carts, ecommerce etc.

You'll want to talk to Adrienne over at FastTransact. (I'd link, but as I'm a newb, the admins won't let me. They're FastTransact.com.) Tell her I sent you.

I used them for several years and my client put over a million a year through their systems without a wobble.