New Credit Card Processing Company

We are getting ready to switch from Webervations to ThinkReservations, which means we also have to find a new credit card processing company. I currently use Square and love them, but Think doesn't support Square. For those of you with Think, can you please share which cc company you're with and if you're happy with them. I now have to buy a cc terminal and there are fees everywhere. This is all a bit overwhelming and frustrating. Everyone wants a piece of my little pie.

Hi,
We use Think with Braintree (https://www.braintreegateway.com/) and have been quite pleased. They dont have any monthly charges just the % of each sale which is competitive. We don't have a terminal just use Think and they have a virtual terminal on their website which you can use, their website is a bit clunky in my opinion but it works.
Let me know if you have any other questions and good luck with your switch to Think. We switched to Think from ReservationKey and have happy with their service and support.
John

Doesn't think have a list of processors they work with?
I'm not sure why you would be required to use a processor other than square. I don't see the need to buy a card machine.

johnd said:

Hi,
We use Think with Braintree (https://www.braintreegateway.com/) and have been quite pleased. They dont have any monthly charges just the % of each sale which is competitive. We don't have a terminal just use Think and they have a virtual terminal on their website which you can use, their website is a bit clunky in my opinion but it works.
Let me know if you have any other questions and good luck with your switch to Think. We switched to Think from ReservationKey and have happy with their service and support.
John.

Click to expand...

Thank you for your input. With Webervations (which I currently have) I receive the guest cc information with the reservation. They don't process the card. I use Square to process the card myself. Can you do that with Braintree? Do they still charge you a fee to just hold the card information? Do they give you the guest cc information directly?

Hi,
WIth Think and Braintree they will automatically charge the deposit assuming you have it configured to do so and then during checkin/out you can charge the guest from the think reservation page. Assuming the guest uses the same card for the balance you dont have to retype anything. If they use a new card you'll need to enter it in think that will then pass it to Braintree for the transaction.
The card information comes from Think, they retain the card details but only show you the type of card and the last 4 digits.
There is no charge to 'hold' the card details from think or braintree, just the transaction charge when you process the payment.
John

We use square simply as a backup. But what processors/gateways do they support. Braintree charges a high fee... like square.

Stripe might be an option

Maybe I'm asking a dumb question, but can you not just use the reservation program to charge the deposit for the stay and continue to use Square to charge the balance when the guest arrives? You would have your fees from both, but seems it would eliminate a need for a CC machine if you don't want to go that route.

We use Thunk and our cc processor is Heartland. Only 4 months in and still tallying fees to get an accurate count but looks like its around 3.5% on the average.

MidwestBB said:

Stripe might be an option.

Click to expand...

Stripe is good

We are in a similar situation having to change reservations systems because we were using Rezovation. We have selected another system and reviewing credit card processor options. We did not use Square, but you might want to inquire with them and you new reservation system if you can continue using Square through an authorize.net gateway. If so, the cost is cheaper if you go through the processor or sometimes covered by the processor, like Square. After doing some simple Google searches, I found that one merchant processor posted positive reviews about themselves and had the lowest rates, which weren't always the case because of hidden fees. I found one site helpful, (https://www.merchantmaverick.com) for reviews and information on different methods processors use for fee structures. My advice would be not to sign a contract for a year, only go with someone that offers a month to month in case you decide to switch processors or even the reservation system if you find it is not what you like. We will most likely stay with our current processor using the authorize.net gateway which the processor is including at no charge to us. We get to continue to use our current equipment. We can continue to research for other options in the future.

MidwestBB said:

Stripe might be an option.

Click to expand...

We like Stripe for our online processor and like them. Also use Square in the office (our web booking calendar doesn't sync w Square yet, otherwise we'd just go with them) Square is so user friendly and easy to understand. All fees seems to be so close, made sense to go with one that was easier to use, its versatility, and follow the fees, etc...