Our payments expert Mikael Christian Carlsen sat down with us and answered frequently asked questions about payment gateways and how the Frisbii payment gateway helps you choose the right acquirer, payment methods and setups.
What is a payment gateway and why do I need it? #
A payment gateway is essential for any web shop to provide secure and effective payment processing.
Some of the benefits are:
- Secure transactions to build customer trust
- More global reach, by offering different payment options, currencies and checkout languages
- Processing automation
- Reduction of fraud risks (e.g. via a risk filter)
- Integration with different eCommerce platforms such as WooCommerce, Shopify, Shopware, Magento, etc.
- Compliance with the Payment Card Industries Data Security Council (PCI DSS)
What do I need to consider when choosing a payment gateway? #
One of the first things you need to be aware of when choosing a payment service provider is PCI DSS compliancy.
So, make sure that you see their attestation of certification, so you know that they are a valid provider (Frisbii’s payment certificates can be found here).
I would always suggest a reference check. Ask the payment service providers what customers they have. And then contact the customers and ask them if the payment service provider is a good partner.
Uptime is also worth looking at to make sure that your payment solution is reliable and doesn’t break down.
And make sure that it’s a provider that matches the payment methods of the countries that are your key markets. Every country has different preferred payment methods, and some can heavily influence whether customers will churn or convert.
The Frisbii payment gateway has more than 50 one-time and recurring payment options, so you can have local and global reach. See the full list here.
What do I need to properly set up a payment gateway? #
So, with Frisbii, it depends on your shop system or CMS. If you’re using WordPress, Magento, WooCommerce, Shopware or Shopify, all you need is to install a plugin to set up the payment gateway.
But for the payment gateway to work, you would need acquiring agreements, so you can accept different payment methods.
Why do I need an acquirer? #
The acquirer’s role is to handle the payout for the merchant. So, if you, for example, were accepting Visa and MasterCard, The Frisbii payment gateway will be handling the authorization of the transaction. This means that we connect to the card acquirer – in a secure fashion. And the card acquirer connects to the card issuer, verifying that this is a legitimate card (which is not reported or lost or stolen).
The acquirer is a financial institution. With an agreement with the acquirer, the merchant is able to process and accept, for example, credit card payments.
Once the transaction has been processed, the acquirer will do the payout to the merchant.
How does the Frisbii payment gateway help with acquirer agreements? #
This is one of the things that we help our merchants with on our platform and through our support. If you sign up for a service with us and you want to accept, iDEAL or Visa, MasterCard, or SEPA payments, we will help you with the application.
You fill out the required data in our product and we will reach out to the acquirers and help with the setup of your acquiring agreements.
And we do this, because we saw that this was a hurdle for a lot of the merchants. Communicating with acquirers is not something that a lot of them have done before. And for us, it was fairly easy to utilize our experience in the payment and subscription industry and help the merchants set up these acquiring agreements.
Additionally – and this is quite unique in the payment gateway market – the Frisbii payment gateway is acquirer agnostic, so we have a lot of different acquirers that you can choose from.
The important thing for us is to make sure that our customers have the best rates and that the specific acquirer(s) fit their needs. This could be markets, or it could be industries that help determine which acquirer(s) are a perfect fit for the individual merchant.
Do I need more than one acquirer? #
You don’t need more than one acquirer, but we usually recommend it for different reasons.
Some merchants have multiple acquirers to make sure that they have a failsafe solution if one acquirer has downtime, so they can quickly switch.
Another reason for multiple acquirers would be licenses to different payment methods and rates. So, you can have one acquirer that only supports Visa and MasterCard. Then you have one acquire that supports American Express. You can have another acquirer that supports Diners Club and JCP. So, you can have multiple acquirers with different methods and rates for the optimal combination.
And we help you with the setups and ensure that the transactions are getting processed through the acquirer that you have made the agreement with.
Does it matter whether my payment gateway is US-based or European? #
It’s a big difference where your payment gateway is operating from and where you’re located. It’s about data protection and GDPR because if you’re a European business, you want to make sure that the service you use is hosted in Europe for compliance reasons. Services outside of Europe almost always require more complex documentation and responsibilities on your side.
Furthermore, a lot of the US providers have a focus on the US market, which is really different compared to the European market.
When it comes to security and fraudulent transactions, Europe has always been ahead of the US, for example, regarding strong customer authentication such as two-factor-authentication. There are still a lot of the US cards and payment providers that haven’t implemented the secure standards that we use in Europe.
Do I need different payment methods for my shop or business? #
You can of course reach a lot of customers just by accepting Visa and MasterCard and Apple Pay, PayPal and Google Pay. But we heavily recommend different payment methods, both to show your local footprint and to build trust with customers.
If you want to build trust and allow the customers to pay with their preferred payment method, it’s a no-brainer to accept these cards.
For example, if you’re a German company and you’re selling to the Dutch market, it can make you a lot more trustworthy (and even appear as a local seller) if you offer iDEAL as a payment option because it’s very popular there.
Additionally, a lot of the local payment methods have benefits and depending on your prices and number of purchases, it helps to see what works best. One of our Danish customers, who is active in the German market, decided to choose SEPA instead of PayPal because their purchase sums are quite high and PayPal takes fees based on the percentage of the sum (which is very attractive for merchants with many purchases at low prices). SEPA, on the other hand, takes a fixed fee, which saved a lot of money for our customer.
Is it difficult to set up different payment methods for payments? #
For the Frisbii payment gateway, it’s fairly easy to set up the different payment methods. For most of our supported payment methods, we will also help you with the onboarding and setting up the contract with the acquirer.
As an example, enabling Apple Pay would just be a matter of you entering your merchant name and clicking “enable”.
Setting up PayPal, you would need some credentials from your PayPal account and once you have enabled it, it’s up and running.
How many payment methods does the Frisbii payment gateway support? #
Frisbii supports over 50 one-time and recurring payment methods, so you can use it for an online shop but also for subscriptions or for recurring customers, if you have club memberships, etc.
We offer the major and global payment methods such as Visa and Mastercard but also a lot of local payment options that are specifically relevant if you are doing business in European countries. You can find the full overview here.
A few examples:
- Austria: EPS
- Belgium: Bancontact, Payconiq
- Denmark: Anyday, ViaBill, Vipps MobilePay, Santander
- Finland: Santander
- Germany: SEPA, PayPal
- Italy: Bancomat Pay, MyBank, Satispay
- Lithuania: Paysera
- Netherlands: iDEAL
- Norway: Vipps MobilePay, Santander
- Poland: blik, Przelewy24
- Portugal: MB Way, Multibanco
- Sweden: Vipps MobilePay, Santander, Swish, Trustly
- Switzerland: Twint
Which eCommerce shops does the Frisbii payment gateway support? #
We offer a lot of plugins that connect your web shop to Frisbii without any coding required.
We support:
- Dandomain
- Drupal
- Dynamic Web
- ideal shop
- Magento
- Opencart
- PrestaShop
- Shopify
- Shopware
- uCommerce
- VirtueMart
- WooCommerce
Can you integrate your accounting solution with Frisbii? #
We offer different ways to connect your accounting solution. We have plugins by accounting partners and from third-party partners:
- Kontolink
- billy (by IEX)
- Dinero (by IEX)
- e-conomic (by IEX)
- Lexware Office
- meneto
- VATsense (by IEX)
- Visam eAccounting (by IEX)
- Xero
And we provide the option to build your own accounting integrations to connect to different systems with a very simple modular if/then-logic to set up your own rules and triggers.
For example, if a transaction is set as ‘sent’, ‘settled’, or ‘refunded’, you want it to do something in another system. So, this could be your accounting system where you want to create a line in your accounting system. It’s fairly simple for developers and power users.
Do I need a developer to set up the Frisbii payment gateway? #
You don’t necessarily need a developer to enable the Frisbii. A lot of it is handled by installing plugins.
But if you want to integrate it to your own backend, we use Open API. So, what you see and can do in the Frisbii dashboard could potentially also be seen and done via your own dashboards in other systems with the right setup.
For these more complex requirements, you would need a developer to help you out. But for the out-of-the-box use of Frisbii, it’s generally not necessary.
How long does it usually take for payments to go through when using Frisbii? #
It’s a big question because it depends on the individual payment method.
If you are accepting credit cards and debit cards, you will get an instant reply for the authorization of the payment, then you have the payout of the transaction. This is governed by the acquiring agreement you have.
Some payment methods are paid out daily. However, for many Visa and Mastercard transactions, there is a two- or three-day delay until the funds are on your account.
If you look at bank transfers, most of them will give you an answer in real-time. For most payments, you see payouts within the range of a few hours or a few business days
When it comes to digital wallets such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, Vipps MobilePay, etc. – these are based on Visa and Mastercard transactions or national payment methods. So, the payout frequencies are the same as with credit cards.
But for most payment options, you will get a real-time answer that tells you if the transaction was approved or declined.
If you have a financing service you might not get a real-time answer, since the finance institution needs to do an approval check. But they are fairly quick to answer on transactions, and you will get a reply if something is pending.
Are there any country limitations for the Frisbii payment gateway? #
The country limitation is not a limitation on the payment gateway. However, it’s important that the acquirer and the payment methods are supported and support the business in the country that you operate in. Sometimes, acquirers don’t work with specific industries or with companies from specific countries or outside of specific regions.
If you have questions, then the best thing to do is to reach out to one of our experts in sales to make sure that you find the right solution. Depending on your country or business, there could be special limitations in regard to which products are you allowed to sell.
So just reach out, we’re happy to help.
