Today’s economy, every cent counts and adding them to your bottom line is possible in the middle of economic crisis. These steps helps you increase your profit and decrease expenses, as well as blocking theft so your business can grow much bigger.
For businesses in the food service industry, running a restaurant point of sale system, this can greatly help you!
Take Checks
They are still widely used, especially among older customers. If you haven’t been accepting checks, start soon. You will be able to find a good equipment that can scan checks as fast as credit cards, measure them against a nationwide database of bad check writers, electronically deposit the money, and guarantee you receive your funds within a few days. In addition, it costs less than for credit cards and adds up 10-15% of your sales—and possibly more if you have many senior customers.
Accepting All Cards
Of course, you’re already accepting cards like Visa and MasterCard. How about Discover and American Express? The latter, in particular, generally accompanies larger transactions. You might have felt hesitated because of the fee, but reconsider—the difference might be a paltry one percent or so, and since American Express transactions are often larger than those of other cards, you’ll make it up in gross profit. Furthermore, if you’re known for accepting all forms of credit and debit cards, your customers will probably be more likely to come back.
Researching For Alternatives
Many vendors think their fees are 1.69 percent plus $.19 because that’s their qualified rate on a tiered pricing program. But often fewer than 20 out of 100 transactions receives low qualified rate and all the rest downgrade and cost one, two, or even three percent. Researching alternate programs that offer different interchange rates could end up saving more than you think.
Insist on Understanding
Neither you nor your bookkeeper would have to scratch the back of your heads over complex credit card statements that just doesn’t fit. A few companies have made extraordinary efforts to simplify these reports. You should be able to reconcile your statement and rates without exceeding 15 minutes.
Using The Internet To Get Reports
The post office is slow, don’t wait any longer for them to deliver you a letter of disputing a charge. With the help of internet reporting, you’ll exactly know what’s up within 24 hours, it allows you to aggressively defend against chargebacks. With this kind of quick response, it can increase your success rates and reduce your losses.
No need to scratch your head over complex credit card statements and for your bookkeeper as well.
Using Card Validation Value and Address Verification System. These highly effective fraud screens proven to reduce losses, and when using them correctly, you can get the lowest possible discount rate.
One more thing, avoid by being PCI compliant. There are mammoth fines charged to merchants who are hacked, and even drives them out of business. Find time to read Visa’s report on noncompliant systems, so you don’t get caught napping.
Reduce Chargebacks
For Internet and phone orders, implementing the “Verified by Visa” or “MasterCard Secure Code” plug-in on your web site eliminates all cardholder nonauthorization chargebacks. Liability for these chargebacks is shifted away back to the issuing card bank, and you qualify for the lowest discount rate available. Just by following this simple step, you could possibly eliminate up to 80% of all chargebacks and increase your profits.
The author of this article is the VP of Customer Relations at POS-For-Restaurants.com with over 20 years experience helping restaurants nationwide increase their efficiency and bottom-line profits with restaurant point of sale systems.
Visit POS-For-Restaurants.com for more information on how our national network of restaurant point of sale professionals can help your business achieve greater success in these difficult economic times.
