Secure Payment Facilities

I've been discussing payment options with a few customers recently. A lot agre with me that PayPal is useful for those who are just setting up - it's very cost effective and a well known brand name. But others have been told by other people not to use it and would prefer to take credit cards themselves.

Now this worries me. I can safely capture credit card details and store them on a secure database, away from the customer's address and other details. My side is not a concern, but when you are a small shop setting out, is this really the way forward?

Consider that for a few months at least, your site is not going to have a page rank. Google took 6 months to update last year and there's no guarantee that even then you get a respectable page rank. If I was a customer considering buying and had to give a shop my credit card details then I'd want that shop to look respectable. If the entire site is grey barred, I'd be worried straight away.

The problem is with handing over the credit card number and the 3 digit number on the back that once you have done that you are trusting the person the other end not to mis-use this information and to correctly destroy all records as soon as the transaction goes through.

Say the assistant prints out the details then jsut throws them into the recycling. ANyone could come along and take them out of the bin and they then know everything about you to be able to start using your credit cards.

OK, maybe this is a subject more suited to my anti phishing blog then web design, but a few years ago it was something like this that resulted in an unknown person spending thousands on my credit cards, so I'm very wary.

I think that without a well known brand name, and that doesn't have to be internationally known, just known within your customer base, it's safest to stick to the more popular payment providers. They might cost a few pence more per transaction, but this extra cost could easily be recouped if more people are shopping with you.

Think carefully before you go your own way, it might come back to bite you.