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Insights and Expertise

How merchant size Enterprise merchants, however, seek more advanced

digital payment acceptance capabilities, additional
influences acquirer digital channels, support for cross-channel customer
journeys, authorization and authentication optimization
– a unified platform architecture, all delivered as part of
selection a cutting edge omnichannel acceptance solution.

Payments innovation as a key differentiator
The level of payments innovation offered is a further
factor to be used when comparing acquirers. One example
is Tap on Mobile, which for an SMB may be used to
reduce the cost of buying a payments acceptance device,
but for an enterprise merchant, this adds significantly
more value from queue busting, self-checkout, assisted
customer service and endless product aisle use cases.

The larger the merchant, the greater the priority placed on
an acquirer's ability to deliver a highly reliable and high-
performance service. Payment processing, particularly
during peak season trading, has become a mission-critical
business service, and merchants simply cannot afford
any downtime, making high resilience a key evaluation
By Lee Jones and Habib Ansari criterion. Most senior executives will prefer to avoid lost
Worldline sales, customer dissatisfaction and brand damage for
the sake of marginal savings on processing fees. While
imes have changed since retailers viewed SMBs are starting to recognize the importance of service
the selection of a merchant service provider reliability, they often undervalue it until they experience
as merely a commodity decision. While the a service outage firsthand.
T finance function may still take the lead, many
other stakeholders and departments are now actively Customer support and account management
involved in the selection process including IT, operations, A key differentiator between acquirers is often the quality
marketing, data security, compliance and procurement. of customer support provided, and this is increasingly a
key decision-making factor. Merchants should compare
Cost remains a critical selection factor, but the lowest cost
is no longer sufficient on its own. Enterprise merchants,
therefore, apply weightings to each decision criteria when What is IC++
scoring request for proposal (RFP) responses. Thanks to
the dramatic increase in the number of providers (and Interchange plus plus (IC++) pricing is a transparent
sales agents) offering merchant services to small and payment processing pricing model commonly used
midsize businesses (SMBs), unsolicited offers of lower by large or enterprise-level merchants. It breaks down
fees are common today, reducing acquirer retention rates. the cost of each transaction into three components:
However, SMBs are increasingly aware that they need the interchange fee (set by the card networks and
to look beyond price if they are to satisfy heightened paid to the cardholder's bank), the card scheme fee
customer expectations and strategic business priorities. (charged by Visa, Mastercard, or other networks), and
the acquirer's markup (the "plus plus" part).
Capabilities previously reserved for large merchants,
like the integration of the payment terminal with the This model allows merchants to see the exact cost of
EPOS register and a wider range of supported payment accepting each card type, providing greater clarity
methods, including digital wallets, are now desired and control over processing expenses. Unlike blended
and valued. For enterprise merchants, vertical sector pricing models, which combine all fees into a single
understanding and experience are crucial, including pre- rate, IC++ offers detailed visibility into the true cost
integration with key sector-specific business applications. structure.

Digital payment needs by merchant size
This is especially beneficial for businesses with
Digital sales channels are critical for most merchants as high transaction volumes, varied card usage, or
online transaction volumes continue to accelerate. SMBs international operations, as it helps identify areas for
are seeking an easy-to-implement, vanilla ecommerce cost optimization. However, it can be more complex to
payments product as part of a one-stop-shop acquiring interpret and may not suit all merchants, particularly
service. smaller businesses.

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