ProMerchant was founded in 2018. It is a merchant service provider that is located in Boston, Massachusetts. This ProMerchant review will discuss the company’s policies, specific features, and standard operating procedures and evaluate them for you to understand their services better.
ProMerchant serves almost all standard-risk businesses, including retail, e-commerce, restaurants, mobile, and mail order/telephone orders. The processor entertains businesses with low, moderate, and high annual sales volumes. The company works with a vision statement that focuses on providing the best services to its clients.
Products and Services
ProMerchant provides almost all standard offerings in the industry. Here is a review of their major services and products;
Merchant Accounts
ProMerchant doesn’t disclose its backend processor on the internet. However, this information is available to merchants when they sign the contract. To aid merchants with their merchant accounts, ProMerchant offers customer support to deal with customers’ queries and issues. Customer support handles dealings with the backend processor, so merchants do not have to get involved. You can trust them to guide you regarding setup and everything in between.
Credit card Terminals
ProMerchant offers numerous credit card machines, including Verifone Vx520. This offers EMV and NFC compatibility for mobile wallets. This caters to several businesses in the restaurant and retail businesses.
ProMerchant offers a free Verifone Vx 520 payment terminal to new merchants in the restaurant business. The terminal is well adapted to the restaurant environment, and here is a review of its notable features;
Verifone Vx520
The Vx520 is among the most secure terminals, thanks to the Verix operating system. The terminal encrypts all data as soon as it enters the system, ensuring the safety of cardholder data. The terminal has a built-in pin-pad so merchants can offer pin-based payments without additional hardware. The terminal also comes with EMV and NFC support to aid modern payment methods.
Payment Gateway
ProMerchant offers the Authorize.Net payment gateway for eCommerce merchants. Authorize is one of the best-reviewed gateways, thanks to countless valuable features. It seamlessly integrates various shopping carts that integrate seamlessly into the merchant’s website. It also has numerous other features like recurring billing and automated fraud detection support. Merchants can retain Authorize.Net services even if they change providers.
Virtual Terminal
ProMerchant offers its clients a choice between two virtual terminals; Authorize.Net and MX Quick Pay. Both these terminals are capable of replacing an in-store POS completely. If the merchant requires a full service-payment gateway, Authorize.Net is a better option. MX Quick Pay is the right choice if one doesn’t have an online presence. The virtual terminals offer recurring billing, among several valuable features.
Mobile Payments
ProMerchant uses the MX Merchant Express app with an EMV-compliant card reader to allow mobile payments. The card reader connects via Bluetooth with newer devices that lack headphone jacks. Although they don’t reveal the charges for the card reader or its mobile processing services, they are reviewed as a pocket-friendly option online.
Point of Sale (POS) System
In hardware options, ProMerchant chose one of the most reputed payment hardware companies; Clover. With the Clover store, merchants can access hundreds of applications to streamline the daily operations of their businesses Clover Station, Clover Mini, and Clover Flex are the models mentioned on their website.
Interchange and Pricing Plans
ProMerchant presents two pricing models. Their first option is an interchange-plus model. Interchange-plus is a fixed interchange rate and transaction fee. This rate structure is very explicit and transparent for business owners.
The second pricing plan is flat-rate pricing. It differs from interchange-plus as it offers the same rate for all credit card transactions. This is a good option for retail and business processes. They also provide merchants with a $500 AMEX gift card if they cannot beat (or meet) their current processing statement with another provider. It is a win-win as merchants get a good deal either way.
Red Flags of ProMerchant
ProMerchant has a clean complaint record with the BBB. While this would have been a fantastic feat, the lack of complaints is only because ProMerchant is a new company. Even the best processors in the industry have complaints against them. It is impossible to make everyone happy in such a competitive world of offerings. However, there are still some concerning factors merchants should review before deciding to go with ProMerchant.
Reputation
As ProMerchant is new in the payment industry, it will not offer the same professional experience that well-established providers do. One of the major concerns is security. While ProMerchant has a clean track record up till now, it is hard to trust a provider that is not tried and tested with sensitive information about your business and clients.
Lack of Transparency
You can see a lack of disclosed information about their offerings on their website, especially their pricing. Merchants have to contact their sales representatives directly to get a feel of their pricing. This way, merchants cannot compare their quotes with what others will get, making it difficult to compare with other processors.
Customer Support Issues
While there are not many negative reviews otherwise, there are a few about their customer care. Even though they have many avenues to contact their customer care services, the representatives are rarely very efficient. Merchants complain that they have to wait long before their problem gets solved.
No Free Trial
While this isn’t a standard offering, and it is not necessary with providers that have spent a long time in the industry, the story is different for newer MSPs. While there is a lot of data bout established providers, the best way to judge whether a new provider is worth signing up with or not is to try out their services. Having a free trial is a way to boost merchants’ confidence in your services and vice versa.
Final Thoughts about ProMerchant
ProMerchant is an adequate processor when you consider what it has to offer. It caters to several different businesses, including brick-and-mortar stores, restaurants and online services. It does not bind its clients with a non-cancellable contract, and there are no termination fees either. Based on this ProMerchant review, it is a good option for newer and smaller businesses.
But for larger and well-established businesses, reputation, security and customer service are essential to consider. If you have a company that cannot take risks with a new provider that has not been tested yet, it is best to look for the bigger names in the industry.
