Building a proper website is the foundation of any ecommerce business. Failure in creating a proper website can guaranty the failure of the online business itself.

There are several options for creating a website. Depending on how new the business owner is to web programming, and the planned budget, the options are either creating a website personally, or outsource your ecommerce website.

View the entire, Guide to setting up an ecommerce website.

Often overlooked, gift cards are one of the most effective customer retention and marketing methods available to businesses.

There are 2 types of commonly used gift cards. The first is the Visa or MasterCard branded gift cards that work just like a credit or debit card. While convenient, these gift cards don’t offer much benefit to most businesses. The second type of gift card is a proprietary self branded gift card, that is essentially an electronic gift certificate. These gift cards also work just like a standard credit or debit card, but are limited to being spent at your own company. For many businesses, these are one of the most effective customer retention and marketing mediums available.

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Hospital ID theft: How to protect yourself – The Red Tape Chronicles – MSNBC.com

Identity theft is a huge risk in the credit card industry but the credit card industry is by no means the only target for identity theft.

Smart Cards looked like they were going to be the next big thing for credit card processing, for about 30 seconds.

A smart card is a small microchip that is implanted in a plastic card or a credit card. It is able to store a large amount of information in a very small space, and is not affected by magnetic fields, weather or really anything. Smart cards also have encryption capabilities that a magnetic strip could never have.

So, why aren’t Smart Cards more popular?

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We just published an area devoted to information about credit card machines on the Merchant Store website. I will be putting up answers to general question about credit card machines there, and there are already some great pages geared toward people who are new to the processing industry.

Information about credit card processing equipment.

ATM FEE FOR GETTING NOTHING

I had never heard of this charge before. It doesn’t come as a surprise, as banks now make more from fees than they do from interest. Just another way to add money to the bottom line at the expense of their customers.

MSN Money – How to dispute a credit card purchase

Here is a great article about the responsible way to dispute a credit card charge. Many consumers don’t know that if they make a chargeback, the merchant will most likely have to pay a considerable fee just as a result of them charging it back. A responsible merchant would try to right their customer as best they can.

I have long thought that consumers should have some negative action against them if they charge back merchandise and lose. This would help to stop the few free-loaders who abuse the credit card system to get free stuff at the expense of the merchant.

SMP Releases Internet Payment Gateway Study

October 24, 2005 (Omaha) – Strategic Management Partners (SMP) announced today that it has released an in-depth study of US based Internet Payment Gateways. The study revealed a number of key factors affecting this growing sector of the merchant acquiring industry.

If you’ve been reading the news over the past few years, you may remember that Walmart has sued Visa and MasterCard several times. While most people don’t remember or care about what Walmart was suing over, corporate lawsuits are about as common as people, the effects of these lawsuits probably have had a direct affect on your business.

Back in 2003, Walmart and thousands of US based businesses won a class action lawsuit against Visa and MasterCard. When the dust settled, there was a 3 billion dollar settlement, and Visa and MasterCard were forced to abandon their coveted ‘all cards accepted policy’.

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American Express sues over topless club tab – U.S. Business – MSNBC.com

$241,000 is a pretty large tab for a strip club. This will be interesting to see which party wins.