Merchant and Portal Account for Call Centers
Call centers provide vital services for companies across the business spectrum. Although the definition of a call center can vary, generally speaking, call centers can answer customers’ questions, provide customer service, conduct research, or solicit new business from potential customers. While they are sometimes considered part of the customer service arm of a business, more often than not, the specialized call centers will contract with businesses to handle these customer service functions.
A merchant account is what allows a call center to do business. It lets any business accept credit card payments, bank payments, and other merchant services.
This can be a challenge for any call center. In theory, all you have to do is call up a merchant account provider and find out how much it will cost you to have them process your payments, set up payment gateways, and manage any other services that you need. However, many merchant account providers consider call centers to be high-risk businesses.
A high-risk business is a business that has certain unique credit card challenges that are specific to how it processes payments. They occur because a company is at a higher risk for either fraud or chargebacks. Fraud occurs when someone makes a payment with your account that is not actually authorized by the cardholder.
