Optimized Payments Consulting Helps Retail Merchants Lower Credit Card Processing Costs With New Research Paper

Atlanta, Ga. (PRWEB) August 20, 2008 -- In today's plastic society, electronic payment processing is a must for businesses to operate and to be competitive. Unfortunately, the high fees associated with credit card processing and merchant accounts are setting recession-hit firms back even further. To help companies meet this challenge, the payment processing experts at Optimized Payments Consulting (OPS) are sharing their expertise (http://www.optimizedpmts.com/blog/index.php)- gained over ten years working with retail, Internet, and healthcare clients - in a new white paper titled "How Accepting ATM Cards Can Improve Merchant Profitability."

The paper reveals how businesses can save 25 to 73 percent on processing costs for every transaction they migrate from signature debit and credit to PIN debit. Businesses leaders seeking ways to keep more of their gross profits can download the white paper at www.OptimizedPmts.com. They can read about the impact this strategy can have on their business and the steps needed to implement it.

"One of the biggest benefits of ATM or PINbased cards for merchants is that they can cost up to 73 percent less than credit and signature debit cards," explains Optimized Payments Consulting founder, Anand Goel. "When those savings are multiplied by thousands, hundreds of thousands or millions of transactions per year, the bottomline benefit is easy to see."

Recognizing that over 90 percent of merchants were unknowingly overpaying for credit card processing services, Goel established Optimized Payments Consulting to help merchants understand and reduce their payment processing costs. In the most recent in a series of white papers on the topic, OPS experts provide in-depth background and analysis on how merchants can accept and promote ATM cards and drive profitability.

By 2010, Morgan Stanley estimates that credit card processing rates will "rise to 1.86 percent and generate $32.4-billion in interchange fees." Those skyrocketing interchange rates, along with processing fees, are squeezing businesses as credit card processing fees eat away at their already shrinking bottom lines. Fortunately for these businesses, there are lower cost alternative payment options. According to Digital Transactions, an industry publication, the use of PIN-based debit cards in the U.S. has been rising faster than signature debit cards and credit cards. Merchant sales volume for PIN transactions has been growing 21 percent annually since 2000, slightly ahead of signature debit and significantly ahead of credit cards. And according to a recent study by Star electronic funds transfer (EFT) network, consumers preferred PIN debit over signature debit, with 54 percent opting for PIN and 38 percent for signature.

This trend spells good news for businesses that know how to leverage it.

Business leaders seeking strategies they can use to lower their payment processing costs can visit http://www.OptimizedPmts.com.

About Optimized Payments Consulting:

Optimized Payments Consulting is an Atlanta, Ga.-based consulting firm that leverages its associates' broad payment industry experience and proprietary software (http://www.optimizedpmts.com/interchange.php) to help businesses reduce their payment processing costs and improve their bottom line. Unique to the industry, the company measures its success by the actual cost savings to its clients, and its consulting fees are risk-free - charged only as a percentage of demonstrated savings.

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