Sean Murray is the President and Chief Editor of deBanked and the founder of the Broker Fair Conference. Connect with me on LinkedIn or follow me on twitter. You can view all future deBanked events here.
Articles by Sean Murray
Learn Merchant Cash Advance or Else…
December 15, 2011If you don’t know about Merchant Cash Advance (MCA), you’re not qualified to work in the payments industry! As indicated by the Electronic Transactions Association (ETA), Certified Payment Professionals (CPPs) should be savvy with MCA financing. According to the ETA: “The [new] CPP program sets the standard for professional performance in the payments industry and is a symbol of excellence. It signifies that an individual has demonstrated the knowledge and skills required to perform competently in today’s complex electronic payments environment.”
CPP candidates can preview exam sample questions in the official handbook, one of which asks:
An established merchant that processes $25,000 in bank card transactions per month has no marketing budget, but has been offered a sponsorship opportunity. What product/solution should the payments professional recommend?
The answer is “merchant funding” AKA MCA. Believe it folks. The MCA financing product is here to stay, has benefitted thousands of businesses, and payment professionals must be well versed in it if they are to become certified.
But there is more than a test to become a CPP.
[The ETA says] to be eligible to sit for the CPP examination, candidates must demonstrate the following qualifications:
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CPP candidates will then be required to sit for and pass a Certified Payments Professional written examination. Upon successful completion of the exam and the attainment of the CPP credential, certificants will be required to meet renewal / recertification requirements every three years, to include continuing professional education from ETA / QSP’s or the successful completion of the test.
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The next exam dates are May 1 – 31, 2012. You can learn more about registering and what it mean to be a CPP on the ETA’s official site. And don’t forget to learn about Merchant Cash Advance. 🙂
Look What We Got: Square
December 13, 2011The folks at Square were nice enough to send us their mobile phone hardware for free to review and play with. We’ll be doing a video review and demonstration within the next week. Stay tuned.
Thanks Square!
MacPOS Review – Functional, but Ugly
December 13, 2011It’s okay, not great. The biggest downside is the ugly interface, which gives the impression that the software functionality must also be subpar. While that does not appear to be the case, it certainly is a distraction during the POS experience.
White borders, mismatching shapes, and overpowering Quick Key instructions:
Review Summmary:
Name: MacPOS
Description: POS system for Apple computers. Not actually made by Apple.
Reviewed by: Sean Murray
Product Reviewed: MacPOS
Date published: 12/13/2011
2 out of 5 stars
Law to Reduce Debit Card Fees to Retailers Has Opposite Effect
December 12, 2011We’ve had many negative things to say about the debit card reform law that went into effect a few months ago (AKA the Durbin Amendment). We’ve repeatedly made claims that retailers won’t participate in the savings but for the few that do, those savings won’t be passed on to the consumer.
According to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, something much worse is happening; Debit card fees are going up!
“Jason Scherr had a lot on his mind the day after he opened his fifth Think Coffee shop in Manhattan last week. The fan was blowing too hard, the classical music was playing a little too loudly—and he was trying to figure out how to get more customers to pay with cash.
Manhattan coffee-shop owner Jason Scherr says his debit-card fees are higher since the Dodd-Frank law.
A new law that was supposed to reduce costs for merchants that accept debit cards has instead sent Mr. Scherr’s monthly processing bills much higher and forced him to reassess the way he does business.
“My choice is to raise prices, discount for cash or get an ATM,” says Mr. Scherr, a lawyer who has been in the coffee-shop business for more than a decade.
Just two months after one of the most controversial parts of the Dodd-Frank financial-overhaul law was enacted, some merchants and consumers are starting to pay the price.
Many business owners who sell low-priced goods like coffee and candy bars now are paying higher rates—not lower—when their customers use debit cards for transactions that are less than roughly $10.
That is because credit-card companies used to give merchants discounts on debit-card fees they pay on small transactions. But the Dodd-Frank Act placed an overall cap on the fees, and the banking industry has responded by eliminating the discounts.
“There will be some unhappy parties, as there always is when the government gets in the way of the free-market system,” says Chris McWilton, president of U.S. markets forMasterCard Inc. He said the company decided that it couldn’t sustain the discounts under the new rate model because the old rates had essentially subsidized the small-ticket discounts.
Merchants now are trying to offset their higher rates by raising prices, encouraging customers to pay in cash or dropping card payments altogether.”
Read the full article at WSJ.com
A Quick Review of LightSpeed POS for Mac
December 9, 2011A quick review by sean himself…
So being the merchant processing savvy person that I am, I got a trial copy of the software and fiddled with it for about an hour, when I decided it was just as simple, fluid, and appropriate as we both hoped it would be. I wouldn’t call myself an expert on the software now but I am confident enough to provide an introduction on what it can do.
Below is a 23 minute step-by-step video that explains the software as if you had just purchased it today. It differs from the tutorials on LightSpeed’s own website because I stripped out the demo bundled features they use to show it off, none of which would have any relevance to your actual business. I don’t normally do reviews so hopefully you can deal with my style of instruction. 🙂
Feel free to e-mail me feedback. Visit LightSpeed’s website to learn more.
Description: POS Software for Mac and iPhone
Review by: Sean Murray
Product Reviewed: LightSpeed POS
Date of Review: 12/09/2011
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
The Occupy Wall Street Million Dollar Question
November 2, 2011I pose this question to you Occupiers of Wall Street:
You’re angry, tired, and sick of the rich Wall Street fat cats. Their overly generous compensation packages are evil. and not just plain old evil, but rather,
EVIL!
at least that’s how the word looks on your cardboard sign in red marker. Getting ahead is hard and you want everyone to know it.
But then… a weird stroke of luck happens… Your cousin just got hired by Goldman Sachs and they’ve asked him if he knows anyone else looking for a job. Your cousin mentions your name and they want to set up an interview. The starting salary is $300,000 a year.
Do you go to the interview?
or would that be…
EVIL?!
