Recurring Billing Payments

Recurring payments are those for which a cardholder gives permission to automatically charge his or her account on a regular basis. The benefits to the merchant include lowering outstanding receivables, improving cash flow and cutting collections cost and bad debt as well as updating the image of your company and enhancing customer service.

The option to pay recurring bills with a card is eagerly sought by the customers with whom you most want to build relationships - young, well-educated, prosperous individuals who use their cards actively and spend heavily. Research shows that these customers want card payment options for automatic bill payment because they:

If the request is submitted via the Internet, the merchant must provide a transaction receipt. The receipt should include the frequency and duration of the recurring transaction as agreed by the cardholder and “Recurring Transaction” indicated on the signature line. The merchant must adhere to Internet transaction requirements regarding cardholder data security and receipt requirements.

To ensure customer satisfaction

The merchant should supply notification of how to cancel a recurring payment authorization. If the merchant allows the recurring payment to be established via the Internet, they must also provide a cancellation option electronically.

To cancel recurring transactions

Recurring transaction prohibitions:
The merchant may not charge finance charges for a recurring transaction. Nor can they deposit the recurring transaction if the cardholder has cancelled, deposit the transaction if the authorization is declined, or submit a partial payment for goods or services purchased in a single transaction. The cardholder account number may not be used for any purpose other than a recurring payment.

Processing recurring transactions:
When submitting a recurring transaction, the “Recurring Payment Indicator” must be included in the authorization record. Authorization is required on all recurring payment transactions. Visa transactions require AVS on the initial transaction. The subsequent Visa transactions do not require AVS unless a change in the cardholder/merchant agreement or the duration of the recurring payment is more than one year apart.

Vantage recommends IPCharge Recurring Payment Solution:
IPCharge, VeriFone's real-time payment gateway, is a feature rich virtual terminal supporting recurring billing. IPCharge is hosted in a premier data center that is staffed 24x7 to ensure reliability and security and supports a broad range of transaction types, including Sale , Pre-Auth, Void, Completion, Return/Credit and more. The IPCharge supports Card Verification Values and Address Verification Services to help reduce fraud and features a consolidation of payment processing, settlement and reporting.

The Recurring Billing feature of IPCharge allows merchants to automatically bill customers on a recurring or installment basis. Manage customers and active contracts, suspended contracts, canceled contracts, and completed contracts including customer name, contract details, contract status, and contract history. Easily communicate with your recurring billing customers by setting up approval emails, contract documents, and decline email templates.

Vantage merchant accounts are also compatible with a wide array of terminals, point of sale systems, and software designed to handle recurring billing payments.

For more information about how to set up automatic card billing including sample authorization forms, contact a Vantage professional using the form below.