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7 Nov 2000 South Africa

Hi there,

I want to open up a merchant account, either in the US or in Europe. My client has a Italian bank account and wishes the money to be paid into that account. I have made several queries, but have only had 1 response so far from an American company. Unfortunately, the amount of money they are asking for the service is more than the cost of the website and way over my client's budget.

Here in South Africa, the laws (as I'm sure would apply in most countries) do not make it easy to allow the transfer of money from the merchant banker here to an account overseas and it is hardly worth it.

My question is this: Can you suggest a company that is based either in the US or in Europe that has the facility for a secure server and a merchant account that we can subscribe to so that the money can be paid directly into the overseas bank accounts?

Thank you

David

Dear David:

Unfortunately, setting up an overseas merchant account, whether in Europe or in America, will be expensive. Either the set up costs will be high or the per-transaction cost will be deadly. Some solutions will require you to set up a shell company in the country where you wish to set up the merchant account.

One alternative to a merchant account that I have heard good things about is PayPal, who do the entire transaction process for you. They also charge a low processing fee. But note, I've never used PayPal myself, so I cannot actually recommend them.

All the best,

Dr. Ecommerce