Credit cards

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You could use your phone or a tablet.

You may be able to do it thru the store if you feel like setting it up, but I never did that.

The Square Invoicing should be available to everyone soon.
 
HackElectric said:
One thing that I've really found useful with CC's is getting a deposit.

Often I will go out and give the customer an estimate, then a few days later get a call from them telling me to go ahead and do the work. When it's a bigger job like a service upgrade I require a deposit, the way I used to do it was to either setup a time to go back to their house to pickup a check or ask them to mail it to me. Now I just tell them over the phone that I could accept their deposit by credit card and 9 times out of 10 they go for it. Now with Square Invoicing, I send them the e-mail invoice, they pay on the secure website, and everyone is happy.

Another thing I do is I mention the fact that I accept credit cards while selling the work. People use credit cards as loans to buy things they don't have the cash for all the time, why should electrical work be any different? A customer might be more willing to add a few more hihats, a surge suppressor, or a generator connection if they know they don't have to pay right away :p
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yeah, we are a credit culture.

the only thing i'd be concerned about, would be a merchant charge back from
a customer. i don't know how much recourse you'd have against that, if any.
i suspect that is more a problem with retail stuff than service providers.

anyone here ever have experience with charge backs?

on that credit culture thing..... it's weird, but CC companies are now all
offering 6 months no interest on CC purchases. almost all of them are.

i got one of those "preapproved" CC offers from capitol one, a business
oriented one, called spark, and i bit on it. logged on to the link they gave,
put in name and SS number, no banking information, and clicked submit.

figured they'd come back with a credit line of $1,200 or $800 or something.
nope... $30k, and a note saying if i wanted up to $50k, i'd have to chat
with a customer rep, and did i want to speak with one now?

a bit flummoxed, i clicked no. $30k is fine, thank you. geez. they don't know
squat about me....

but this "no interest for six months" thing had me wondering... i've got this
powerful lust for a new race bike running, so when the card showed up,
i authorized it, and bought $20 worth of gas to see if it really worked...
and i called up their friendly customer service folks, and asked about purchases.

yes, any purchase you make, no interest for six months. so i said the purchase
i was going to make, the merchant didn't accept credit cards... what do we do now?

they sent me a check for $15,000. no fees, no interest if paid within six months.
made payable to me. deposit it in my checking account, and do whatever i want
with it.

i read the fine print.... you don't want to go past six months, and you sure don't
want to miss a payment. past six months, and you get interest starting FROM
THE TIME THE PURCHASE WAS MADE, at 24% interest.

miss a payment, and you get interest, from time of purchase, of 30%.

guess they are really hoping i'll miss a payment. oops.:happysad:
 
mgookin said:
I've signed up for Square. Pretty simple. Thanks!

Question: I now see they don't allow you to enter a credit card via a pc (only stupidphones). So what's the answer to that? Do I have to build an online store and run the transaction through that?
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something about square i discovered.... the first transaction was
for $1,500, and they were gonna keep almost all of it for 30 days.
i sent them an email, and they released it after two days...

you may want to check into that. dunno if that policy has changed.
 
fulthrotl, yes, those policies have changed a while back. I've been using Square for about a year and never had any issues. I'll charge $2,500 and have it in my account the next day (once in a while it takes 2 days).
 
mgookin said:
Interestingly all these companies are doing is having a computer system with a blip in and a blip out. They are raking in big money for doing pretty much nothing.
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You expect too much from the banking/finance industry. Unlike attorneys you can talk to them for free, but there will be a charge for anything they do no matter how simple it may be.

Fulthrotl said:
figured they'd come back with a credit line of $1,200 or $800 or something.
nope... $30k, and a note saying if i wanted up to $50k, i'd have to chat
with a customer rep, and did i want to speak with one now?

a bit flummoxed, i clicked no. $30k is fine, thank you. geez. they don't know
squat about me....
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$30k is pocket change to billion dollar industry, with the interest and other fees they make they can afford the risk of occasional $30k bad accounts. To get a higher limit credit line at a lower interest rate they will want more information or even a secured line of credit.
 
Fulthrotl said:
something about square i discovered.... the first transaction was
for $1,500, and they were gonna keep almost all of it for 30 days.
i sent them an email, and they released it after two days...

you may want to check into that. dunno if that policy has changed.
Click to expand...

I signed up last Friday, bought a the little scanner from Walgreens for $10 (they're shipping me two free ones, and will reimburse my $10 for the one I bought). I experimented at home with my own cc for a $1 charge-no problems.

Used it for a $925 customer charge yesterday, $899.56 is in my account this morning. (Job total was $2700, customer gave me 2 money orders for $900 each, and agreed to pay the 2.75% fee to charge the last $900)

I'm very impressed!
 
electricguy61 said:
I signed up last Friday, bought a the little scanner from Walgreens for $10 (they're shipping me two free ones, and will reimburse my $10 for the one I bought). I experimented at home with my own cc for a $1 charge-no problems.

Used it for a $925 customer charge yesterday, $899.56 is in my account this morning. (Job total was $2700, customer gave me 2 money orders for $900 each, and agreed to pay the 2.75% fee to charge the last $900)

I'm very impressed!
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If increased the invoice from 900 to 925 to cover fees - you either had the wrong fees or they ripped you off by 44 cents:happyyes:
 
Does anyone know how to get it to work on a pc at my desk?
From what I can see it only works on stupidphones.
 
kwired said:
If increased the invoice from 900 to 925 to cover fees - you either had the wrong fees or they ripped you off by 44 cents:happyyes:
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electricguy61 said:
I like round numbers, so I ate the 44 cents.
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In order to calculate the fee of 2.75% in order to add it on to the amount you are owed, you need to divide that amount by .9725.

Let's say you are owed $1,000 by the customer.

1,000 / .9725 = 1,028.28

So you charge $1,028.28 thru Square.

Now Square is going to take their fee of 2.75% off the top and leave you with the rest.

1,028.28 X .0275 = 28.28

They take $28.28 leaving you with exactly $1,000.

I used a Sharpie to write "divide by .9725" on the back of the card reader incase I want to charge the fee.



 
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HackElectric said:
In order to calculate the fee of 2.75% in order to add it on to the amount you are owed, you need to divide that amount by .9725.

Let's say you are owed $1,000 by the customer.

1,000 / .9725 = 1,028.28

So you charge $1,028.28 thru Square.

Now Square is going to take their fee of 2.75% off the top and leave you with the rest.

1,028.28 X .0275 = 28.28

They take $28.28 leaving you with exactly $1,000.

I used a Sharpie to write divide by .9725" on the back of the card reader incase I want to charge the fee.
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Thanks Hack, but I did pass junior high math, so I know how to do it . I just like round numbers. :D

And you have to be careful in California, as it is illegal to charge a fee for using a credit card. You can offer a cash discount though.
 
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HackElectric said:
I replied to this question the first time you posted it.


Stupidphone :roll:
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Thanks Hack. After hours of messing with their website I guess that info fell out of my brain.:slaphead:

Maybe I'll get a friend to install it on their phone.

The tiny phone I have today is awesome and that's not going to change. :thumbsup:

Thanks again.
 
Found the answer. Buddy has an old Droid he does not use. I can use it on wi-fi with the swiper from Square. It will work great because we only take cc a couple times per year and only for sample quantities.

Problem solved!

Thanks again guys for all the help. This venue is invaluable. :thumbsup::thumbsup:
 
I have been using PayPal and have been happy with them.

I believe it is 2.9 per swipe and 3.75 per manually entered transaction.

Sounds like square is a bit cheaper.
 
electricguy61 said:
Thanks Hack, but I did pass junior high math, so I know how to do it . I just like round numbers. :D

And you have to be careful in California, as it is illegal to charge a fee for using a credit card. You can offer a cash discount though.
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It is illegal to itemize such a fee, you can still include an extra percentage in any markup or other fees that are legal to itemize to make up for the same amount though, just like you typically do for all other overhead expenses. You don't normally bill customers for their share of the cost of your other overhead expenses, you just add what is necessary to existing fees and markups to cover your overhead.
 
I just got an e-mail from Square about a new feature. You can swipe credit cards when you are offline. So if you are out of cell phone service of if you use a tablet without cell service, you can swipe the credit card on the spot and then have it register when you go back somewhere with service or WiFi.

This is a good feature for people without smart phones, all you need is a basic tablet that could run the square app. When you get back to the shop you can connect it to your Wifi to finish the transaction.
 
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