Payment gateway choices in South Africa
So, you're a South African who's set up a drupal site and you want to sell stuff - and have your money put in a South African bank account. What are your payment gateway options?
Well, first off, you'll need to sign up for a merchant account at your local bank - who will want a business plan from you - and most banks charge you for the setup. Then you'll probably pay fees of around R100/month (?) for that account. The banks take between 5 and 7% per transaction ( ::sigh:: ). Then sign up with a payment gateway and you're ready to accept online transactions. The question is, which payment gateway?
I've only used Virtual Card Services (VCS) before, and the technical integration into a site is pretty simple. You'll pay R125/month for VCS privileges...and R1 + 0.5% per transaction. There's a module for ecommerce and one in the pipeline for ubercart.
I haven't used any other gateways. Some suggestions are:
- PayPal (except if you're in SA they won't let you accept money. These guys reckon they've found a workaround involving somehow linking a Master Card to a PayPal account - although you'll have to buy the $6 ebook to find out how.) PayPal will charge you $30/month and 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction.
- Authorize.net (who don't provide services directly to a client, but have a list of resellers who do. I referred a client to them, and after several months they were unsuccessful in getting an account - being in South Africa is apparently a problem.)
- Worldpay - one of my clients used them (on an html site) with success. 200 pounds setup, 300 pounds per month, 4.5% per transaction.
Google tells me that some other options for South Africans are:
- pricetag.co.za - R570 setup fee, R200/month, 5.7% per transaction
- MWEB - R590 setup, R350/month, R5.70 per transaction
- iVeri - couldn't find prices on their site
- Setcom - no monthly fees (HOORAY!), 4.9% + R4 per transaction. R8/withdrawal. [update: casperl says he uses it for smaller volume sites]. Here's a good breakdown.
- Paygate - [info from Max_headroom] - 4 packages. The Small package: R200 set-up (other packages free). 3 month contract. Min Monthly fee: R100. Per transaction: R1.00 + 0.5%.
- MyGate - 2 options:
- Express (no merchant account): R250 setup fee, R150 subscription fee (whatever *that* is?), you don't need to set up a merchant account, and there is no monthly fee. 6% per transaction.
- Standard - R200 setup fee, no subscription fee, no % per transaction (the only guys who do this, it seems), R1.50 per transaction.
- There's also MyGate 300 (R300/month, R1.50/transaction) and MyGate 600 (R600/month, R1.40/transaction) options.
- [added] PayFast - not yet able to accept credit card transactions, but will in the last quarter of 2008 (according to an email I got from them today).
- [added] AlertPay - someone directed me here, and they say they're compatible with SA bank accounts. No signup fee, 5% + R2.70 per transaction with no monthly fees. But users have had problems with them.
- [added] Netcash - R120/month.
- [added] Payment Express - costs are calculated on a sliding scale based on the number of monthly transactions. There's a setup fee of $50 or less, and $.50 per transaction, as well as monthly fees of at least $50. Integrates with most SA bank accounts.
- [added] 2checkout - $49 to open the account, no monthly fee, 4.5% per transaction value. $10 for the transfer to the SA Bank Account, minimum release level of $300 (source)
- [added] CCNow - $10 signup, 4.99% of gross sales plus $0.50 per transaction, monthly fees of $10 (unless you're selling more than $100/month). You *must* sell physical products.
- [added] ClickandBuy - used by iTunes. Looks really good, but I couldn't find any pricing on their site.
- [added] payment24.co.za - 2 options:
- Credit Card Verification: once-off setup fee of R299, R129 monthly subscription, 6.9% credit card transaction fee, Payout Fee – First R5000 FREE - R15 per R1000 thereafter
- Pay-As-You-Go Solution: once-off setup fee of R499, no monthly subscription, 7.5% credit card transaction fee plus R10 per order, Payout Fee R15 per R1000
[added] Workarounds:
- Open an offshore account (via Barclays, for instance, or a Swiss account like Credit Suisse or UBS, or a UK account with LloydsTSB (see instructions)) and link that into PayPal. Then wire the money into SA.
- Speak nicely to a friend overseas and get them to get a 'pay-as-you-go' credit card and link it into paypal.
- Sign up with some payment processor which accept payments and then mails you the cheque periodically. Some people get paid via Google Adsense like this.
So, who's using what and which one would you recommend to someone wanting to accept credit card payments in South Africa? One thing is clear - we need a PayPal-like company here!
[update: apparently it's illegal to have a "donate" button on your site unless you're a registered non-profit in SA]
[update: you have to declare all money you receive online if you're a South African-based business. Otherwise SARS will hunt you down.]
[added] POLi is really interesting. It's licensed by Setcom and allows anyone with a South African bank account to pay you directly, except POLi ties it all together in a neatly integrated package. In other words, it functions as a payment gateway, but with bank accounts instead of credit cards. It takes the buyer to their online internet banking account, where they log in, and POLi adds a "once off payment" page which they buyers uses to pay the seller. It then redirects back to the seller's site. Nice! Cost: 3.4% + R4 per transaction. The drawback is that you'll need to install an ActiveX control in Internet Explorer...non-doze users, sorry. ::sigh:: See this comment for more info.
hmm, ive often wondered ...
hmm, ive often wondered this myself. at our company we use www.netcash.co.za for all of our payment stuff. i know the guy who developed/develops paygate and i believe that it is very good.
I would say go for netcash as it is really simple and they offer everything that paypal offers you. netcash costs R120.00 per month.
hope this helps you.
theamoeba
espresso online
Per transaction fee
Thanks, theamoeba - do you pay a per-transaction fee with netcash?
yes u do ...
yes u do ... I do not know how much, but you can have a look at this page to find out what they do: http://www.netcash.co.za/FrontEnd/service/service_features.asp
theamoeba
espresso online
Don't use NetCash!
These are the Netcash fees for their "virtual credit card terminal" product - R136.80 per month, R1.14 per transaction and 5.7% transaction fee - these prices include VAT.
Only problem is - their product doesn't work! Every so often (7% of transactions in my case), the "call back" from their credit card processing page times out and doesn't notify your calling page that a transaction has taken place. This means that your customer is charged on their credit card without that charge being reflected on your NetCash account and without your system knowing about it! I speak from experience - after calls from irate customer's alerted me to this fault in the NetCash service I immediately canceled my account with NetCash. I followed their procedure by faxing through my 30 days notice of cancellation (which they acknowledged receiving) and guess what - they STILL processed a debit order off my account for the monthly fee! Don't use these cowboys - if there is anyone else who has had the misfortune of using NetCash and have had problems, there is an organisation called the "Payments Association of South Africa" (PASA), www.pasa.org.za - forward your complaint to Pierre Coetzee (PierreC@pasa.org.za).
The other serious flaw I see with Netcash is that they charge you the R1.14 card processing fee regardless of whether sensible card details were processed or not. It would be very easy to write a little script that submitted a test visa card number of 4242424242424242 to your account 10 000 times say, and you would be charged 10 000 X R1.14. Amazingly their system allows this!
Looking for NetCash config, Module
I'm looking at using NetCash.
Can you perhaps share how to configure Ubercart for NetCash?
Much appreciated. And thanks for being so active ; )
Processing Credit Cards using NetCash:
I spoke to them the other day - apparently they are rewriting their IF for C/Card - apparently due to Law changes...
Thus they currently only offer the Debit facility. It can apparently be used to debit a C/Card though.
Thanks, theamoeba
Emile
www.ServeLime.com
Entrepreneurship is a journey to a fulfilled life - make it so.
I've looked at this a few times with no luck so far.
The best looking one to me so far has been DPS (a kiwi company) that pay out to saffer bank accounts. I've only seen a ubercart module so far for them again nothing past a beta. www.paymentexpress.com
I was interested in the mygate option but I have not found a modules for ubercart (or e-commerce as a last ditch effort). Has any one got a module for this one?
Paygate et al
I'm also looking into all the gateways at the moment. Just to clarify: Some monthly fees are actually minimum fees. So if your transaction fees are less than x, you have to pay x.
You have to ask Paygate for price list. They also have different scenes: Basic, small, medium, high. The Small package are as follows: R200 set-up (other packages free). 3 month contract. Min Monthly fee: R100. Authorisation: R1.00 Settlement: 0.5% (for CC on web page).
PM me and I'll email you the complete price list.
Who to choose? I haven't registered for anything yet. Looks like a lot of the gateways are affiliated to the banks. Mygate with FNB, Paygate with Standard, VCS with Nedbank (I think). But I'm sure they'll do other banks.
I've made a module for Paygate on Ubercart. Paygate have a nice test site where you can test your setup first. I'm planning on making a Mygate module as well. If somebody wants to play with the Paygate module, you are welcome to it, but if you want to use it for a live site, let me first load it up through the Drupal system.
I also wondered what's up with Paypal? What's the reason they not doing payments in SA? Probably security. Thanks for the headsup on Netcash, I'll check it out.
Quentin
Paypal
Paypal not in South Africa is due to the tax man not being able to track payments into/out of the country. So they just don't allow it, funny that one of the Paypal founders is a South African.
Here is a nice overview of the issue http://imod.co.za/2008/02/13/i-called-paypalcom-today-from-south-africa-...
Where can one get their hands on these modules you are talking about?
thanks, Lathan.
Jucallme Design Studio
Setcom
I have a couple of Drupal sites selling a limited range of products or memberships and have found Setcom to be the best option for my current needs.
I am not using a shopping cart but make use of "buy now" buttons that either lead directly to Setcom payments or to a Setcom shopping cart offering a range of products available on that particular website.
There is an existing Setcom interface for Drupal 4.7 for the Drupal Ecommerce module. It should not be too difficult to upgrade to Drupal 5/6.
The charges levied by Setcom are higher than other other E-commerce gateways. This makes Setcom unsuitable for a site with many low-value transactions or a site with a high volume of individual transactions. However with a site processing a limited amount of transactions a month above R200 in value, Setcom is a valid option despite what the "experts" may say.
My best tip: Prepare a thorough business plan/operation document called an "E-Commerce Implementation Manual" for your website. Document your product(s), your organisation, your procedure, your delivery procedures, your return policies, your website, your directors / owners etc. Presenting this document to Merchant Gateway companies, banks, FICA regulations and the authorities opens doors and avenues that might otherwise be closed to you. This document allows you to do your homework without paying your school fees in actual money.
The above is especially applicable if you are selling non-tangible goods such as membership fees, advertising space or internet services. Doors close in your face when you are not selling physical goods such as books for example and the E-Commerce Implementation manual plays a part in overcoming the skepticism.
Don't neglect the facility of a "Direct deposit" option into a bank account for South African buyers as a payment system. I find the at 80% of my South African purchases are via the Direct deposit option and not Setcom/Credit card transactions. Also bear in mind that in SA there are (many) people that will pay by sending a cheque in the post, no matter what technology exists - so allow for their payments as well.
For now, Setcom works for me. I don't have a "store" with hundreds of products and therefore don't need a shopping cart. Their per transaction fees are higher than other options, but I have a low-volume, high value product that negates that objection. They process their payments on Tuesdays and the money is in my account on Wednesday. Setcom converts funds from US dollars / Euro / Sterling to SA rand at my request which saves me a further R120 fee for depositing foreign currency into a SA bank and allows me to hold funds in a foreign currency in order to benefit from the exchange rate. Setcom does not charge a monthly fee while most e-commerce gateway providers in SA do, and this does compensate for their higher transaction fees. This may seem incidental, but it allows you to monetize many smaller websites which may sell a low-volume product or membership.
Be aware that there is a substantial list of products, goods and services that Setcom and other Merchant gateways do not handle. Also be aware that it is illegal to receive donations (the Paypal donate style button) in South Africa, unless you are a registered non-profit organisation with a NPO number. In the past I have had to refund contributors in order to avoid criminal prosecution for having had a "Donate" button on a SA website.
FWIW, avoid non South African ecommerce gateways since you don't have recourse to South African law. Especially avoid Moneybookers in the UK, as you will not receive your money from them now matter what you do and how much you correspond with them. And since you are not resident in the UK, you cannot appeal to the UK banking ombudsman and you will be faced with prohibitively expensive UK civil legislation. Even then Moneybookers will simply use the UK version of the FICA regulations to motivate their non-payment.
Substantial school fees IRO e-commerce in South Africa have been paid by me and no doubt by many others. Distrust the experts with abundant advice unless they have done it themselves, and bear in mind that very few experts have.
In many respects PayPal would have been perfect for me, but I happen to live on the wrong side of the planet.
Not relevant to this discussion, but I do sell goods on eBay and since I cannot utilise Paypal to receive payments, I have used a Setcom Buy-Now link to receive payment for those products.
I hope this helps.
Casper
Getting interesting
@Lathan: Thanks for the link, the comments there make for an interesting discussion.
@Casper: Thanks for the tips!
To be honest, I had some doubts starting up a business idea because of all the hassles with on line payments in SA, but I feel a lot better now.
Quentin
payment24
I found another one: http://www.payment24.co.za/
Also a gateway. You don't need to apply for a merchant account with the bank. They have al kinds of packages from selling you a store package to DIY.
I'm also a bit confused with two of the packages:
Credit Card Verification
If you have access to technical resources and have your own database driven shopping cart, then you can integrate to Payment24 directly. The user would select which product(s) to purchase on your website. Once the user is ready to pay for the selected products, you would redirect the user to Payment24, supply us with the relevant transaction information (amount and user information) and we will take care of the credit card transaction. On completion, the user would be redirected back to your website. All the ASP/PHP pages that you require to communicate with Payment24 will be provided to you
[Once off setup fee of R299, R129 monthly subscription, 6.9% credit card transaction fee, Payout Fee – First R5000 FREE - R15 per R1000 thereafter]
Pay-As-You-Go Solution
For the tech-savvy vendor, we also have a Pay-As-You-Go solution available. Basically, it works the same as the Credit Card Verification option; however there are no monthly charges and the commission percentage is slightly higher. It also requires the Vendor to maintain his/her own shopping cart.
[Once off setup fee of R499, no monthly subscription, 7.5% credit card transaction fee plus R10 per order, Payout Fee R15 per R1000]
Something else to note. Payfast (mentioned above) might not do CC, but they have a nice system called Instant EFT. I can well believe Casper that most people in SA would rather pay by EFT or COD than CC as CC is not so big here in SA. Basically works like this: buyer orders from seller site, he gets directed to Payfast gateway as normal. while there he gets instructed to do EFT with internet banking. Payfast get instant notification and buyer is send back to seller site. Both buyer and seller gets instant confirmation of transaction, just like CC transaction. Transaction cost is 2% for under R25K. Anybody had some dealings with them? I'm going to investigate them a bit more.
Quentin
Setcom
Hi,
I would just like to clarify Setcom's three Payment options. Setcom does have a PayPal like solution that does not require a Merchant account and is able to trade in USD...
~ Person-to-person account
No Merchant account needed
No monthly fee and no Set-up fee - pay only as you transact
Trade in USD and ZAR
~ Merchant Direct account
Merchant account required with either ABSA, Standard or FNB (remember, the banks will charge monthly fees and between 3 - 5% per transaction for a merchant account)
Setup, Monthly and per transaction fees with Setcom
~ POLi - Instant Bank Transfers
No Merchant account needed
A fantastic new solution that allows you to accept online payments without the risk of credit card transactions
Bronwyn
Excellent!
Setcom looks like a really good option. Definitely in the top 2 that I'm looking into. Bronwyn, do you have a drupal module which plugs into ecommerce.module to use setcome as a payment gateway?
I checked out POLi earlier today - it's really good! It essentially allows buyers to do an online transfer from their account to your account (so no credit card authorisation fees) securely (POLi facilitates the transfer and doesn't have any internet banking access details passing through it) and then redirects back to the shopping cart, in much the same way a credit card payment gateway would. It's an excellent idea for the South African market - the only (deal-breaking) drawback is that it only supports Internet Explorer 6 onwards (you need to install an ActiveX control for POLi to work). But if they develop something that is browser-independent then it would actually be used...
So there's the gauntlet, Setcom! Thrown down and everything! :)
Drupal Module
sigh and we do SOOO love a challenge ;) Watch this space... never know what might happen in the next couple of months...
We found this on the net
http://www.jumpingbean.co.za/gpl/setcom_drupal_module not 100% sure how reliable it is - we have sent an email to the developers to see if they have a new module and we are awaiting a response from them... Will let you know when we have feedback
Bronwyn If I plan to use
Bronwyn
If I plan to use Setcom, and it looks very likely, I can/will make a module. I use Ubercart for my cart. Do you have any technical documents and also a test site where I can link to for testing while developing?
Quentin
Test accounts for Setcom
It would be great if you made a module. The implementation guide can be found in our help section and you can always mail support@setcom.com with any questions.
For the seller:
Merchant Identifier: 1234567893
Username: testseller3@setcom.com
Password: testseller
To buy, use the below test buyer details:
Username: testbuyer@setcom.com
Password: testbuyer
Bronwyn
More news on this front.
The e-commerce VCS module turned 1.0 today. How ever support on the module is a bit bad, got a reply to a question I asked 7 months ago.
"Haven't had any issues or bug reports, I guess that makes this module ready for 1.0 release." out of the release notes. I guess no one has used ur module :P
Jucallme Design Studio
Its great this discussion is finally happening.
At last... a discussion on this elusive subject thats look like its going to result in some good stuff...
An updated Setcom Ubercart Payment Gateway module would be amazing... setcom has a good system and it would be great to get it talking effectively to Drupal.
I believe there is a module being developed for Netcash at current that I will post more about when I know more.
Thanks to everyone above for their suggestions and ideas.
Gregg
Payfast
Just stumbled upon this, http://www.payfast.co.za/c/std/v/instant-eft
Also from their FAQs page:
Q: Can I receive money from international buyers?
A: No, currently you cannot receive money from international buyers, but when credit card payments are implemented later in 2008, you should be able to.
Looks promising. Let's hope the Beta goes well.
Was just doing a bit of
Was just doing a bit of reading over at imod with the comments there
ooo this is scary - can setcom really do this? "Not one of these systems have all the functions, except perhaps setcom.co.za - but they harass my clients. If the bill is over a certain amount they phone the client and demand a fax of the front and back of the credit card before they release the funds. Clearly a security issue!"
http://imod.co.za/2008/02/13/i-called-paypalcom-today-from-south-africa-...
Jucallme Design Studio
Setcom Security
We take security and credit card fraud very seriously at Setcom! We will only ever ask a card holder (buyer) to fax a through card statements if we suspect fraudulent use of the card (we no longer accept copies of cards as now days it is very easy to get copies of cards fraudulently). You must understand that in the P2P system we are the one's accountable to the bank for any chargebacks, therefore we can if necessary ask the card holder to fax through proof to us that they are authorised to make use of the card in question. We now have a new verification system in place which basically eliminates the need for buyers to fax us anything. Its a very fine balance to try and create, protecting the Seller (and authorised card holder) from fraud, and still creating an easy to use payment system. But we have had less that 0.04% fraud on the P2P system in the last 8 months... so it must be working!
Bronwyn
Thanks Bronwyn, Nice to get
Thanks Bronwyn,
Nice to get some feed back from the horses mouth and not just something from a "broken telephone".
Jucallme Design Studio
Losing Customers
I've chatted to 2 people doing business online who moved OFF Setcom, because they got fed-up with losing Business through Setcom's "harassment" of their Customers - apparently demanding, not customer-friendly and demanding all kinds of identity verification (ID, address, etc).
I suspect Setcom's Fraud-detection rules fire incorrectly for eTrading vendors (incorrect/inappropriate fraud-profile or something).
I've read + heard that online definitely has a different behavior-pattern to Bricks-n-Mortar. My friend told me even PayPal implements a physical address verification process once your trading exceeds a certain limit (he went through that process).
Side topic: (Not SetCom)
The one guy had funds withheld by the Gateway Co and had to fight for months to get them to release his money. They had him jumping through all kinds of hoops to prove it wasn't money laundering / fraudulent transactions.
Entrepreneurship is a journey to a fulfilled life - make it so.
ServeLime.com
Info on Fraud Rules + Interaction with Customers
It would me much much appreciated if you can (arrange) comment on the comments I made previously:
1. Threshold Rules for checking for Fraud.
2. Process required to be followed (so we can at least ward Customers/educate them re this process and why it's "good" for them)
Thanks for all your input, Bronwyn ;))
Emile Botha
Entrepreneurship is a journey to a fulfilled life - make it so.
ccnow
a collegue of mine has just created a Drupal ecommerce plugin for CCNOW that's one of the listed gateways on your list.
I was helping to test it earlier and I notice it does accept ZAR - South African Rand and the following other currencies: USD - U.S. Dollars, EUR - Euros, AUD - Australian Dollars, CAD - Canadian Dollars, GBP - Pounds Sterling, CHF - Switzerland Francs, DKK - Danish Kroner, HKD - Hong Kong Dollar, INR - Indian Rupees, JPY - Japanese Yen, NOK - Norwegian Kroner, NZD - New Zealand Dollar, SEK - Swedish Krona
It pays by cheque or wire bank transfer into the shop owners bank account.
The only downside of ccnow, that I can see, is that they don't offer Instant Payment Notification...you know, like the way your Drupal site knows when a paypal or worldpay payment has been made automatically. CCnow requires you to login to your drupal site and mark a transaction as paid. That said, you have to login to ccnow anyway to mark products as shipped, so, I supposed it's not a big deal for a shop doing a medium amount of sales each day. It's also a physical only payment option. you can't sell downloads (or services, I think).
The ccnow.module is in beta at the moment and should be released soon on drupal.org, if anyone is interested.
The project that requires the ccnow.module is a music project and CCNOW automatically reports sales to Soundscan (for the charts) which is important for the client.
DON'T USE PRICETAG.CO.ZA - 1.5 man show and they suck
Hi,
I came across this page, very useful info. Thanks. I used Pricetag.co.za for a while then reliazed that they never respond after 9-5 during week days.. did some digging around and found out that 1 chick runs this from the back of her house. The guy who developed it works only part time or whatever, doesn't even work for it. has some other job. that made me really uncomfortable.
From technical and service delivery point of view, there service really sucks. very rude chicks sends you threatning mails about charge backs and gives no reasons whatsoever. I will never trust them with my money.
Worldpay is a good option. stick to that.
PayFast, the South African alternative to PayPal
Hey everybody,
I followed the link to the imod post and then to http://www.payfast.co.za
Now how to create a module to work with my eCommerce module so that I can sell via the online shop instead of "Buy Now" buttons.
Anyone know how?
Haroun
PayGate module for Ubercart
Hi All
PayGate module for Ubercart:
http://drupal.org/project/uc_paygate
Thanks to theamoeba for the D6 port. :)
Quentin
www.webnthings.co.za
Setcom module for Ubercart
Development was sponsored by Setcom.
Support (Elsbé) was also great in helping and testing this module.
http://drupal.org/project/uc_setcom
demo: http://ubercart.webnthings.co.za
Quentin
www.webnthings.co.za