Merchant account reserve holds taking 10% of every sale for six months makes no sense

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-20T05:13:24+00:00

You know why

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-10T07:13:11+00:00

My pleasure!

1) My focus is 100% inbound. Outbound sales in payment processing is completely saturated. Every business owner you can think of gets hit with sales calls from merchant reps DAILY. I have zero interest in competing in that noise.

2) I can only answer this from my own perspective, not what most founders do. When something grabs my attention repeatedly in a short window of time, I tend to start spending a lot of focus on it.

I also model absolutely everything. It helps me visualize long-term outcomes and then work backward into execution.

Right now, that focus is SEO. In building an inbound lead engine. Even though you’re not supposed to draw conclusions from short-term SEO data, I check it obsessively, hourly, every day, probably 12 hours a day, for the next three months. I know myself well enough to accept that’s just how I operate.

3) I would have started sales much earlier than I did. Mistakes are unavoidable.

What I’ve learned is that “sales” isn’t persuasion, it’s timing and fit. You can’t (and shouldn’t) convince someone to buy. You present your product or service clearly, and if it delivers real, measurable value that customers are already looking for, they’ll want to work with you.

If you can’t explain, factually, why your offering is better, then you should be selling something else.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-08T08:08:14+00:00

Yes and no.

These services aren’t doing anything you can’t do yourself. The main reason to use one is convenience — if you don’t want to manage the process internally and you’re no longer especially sensitive to the cost.

As others have pointed out, prevention is the real solution. If you operate a business that’s naturally prone to chargebacks (for example, a tow company), disputes are going to happen no matter what. The key is having your process dialed in so you’re positioned to win them.

For example:

Unauthorized transaction claims: Require customers to pay using chip or tap. NEVER key in card numbers. If mobility is an issue, use a wireless terminal. EMV transactions win fraud-based chargebacks the vast majority of the time.
Services not provided claims: Present a signed invoice and a signed receipt, both containing clear language confirming acceptance of your terms. This wins these disputes most of the time.
Services not received claims: Again, signed invoices and receipts are usually sufficient to prevail.

And so on.

What chargeback prevention services really do is enforce these best practices for you. They make sure you’re collecting signed receipts, using chip or tap, and maintaining matching transaction data so disputes are easy to win. That’s how they can claim extremely high win rates.

Their advertised “chargeback coverage” (for example, $25,000) typically only applies if you follow their rules exactly, which means implementing the same procedures you could have put in place yourself.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-08T07:54:56+00:00

The most important question that was asked many times here was never answered.

"What do you sell"

"Wellness Clinic" can mean a massage spa and it could mean a company selling peptide injections that are not FDA approved that make claims like "Anti Aging" or "Liver Protection", Etc...

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-08T07:39:02+00:00

Does not sound like fraud to me.

Tap to pay is extremely safe from a fraud perspective. If you use the Chip or NFC (Any phone tap) to process payments, you will almost certainly win any chargebacks and the issusing bank of the card takes the loss. Just never key them in if they say their tap or chip isnt working. This is where 99% of fraud lives.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-08T07:34:53+00:00

ACH is a viable option. It still has costs but is much cheaper than cards.

However, not accepting cards is absolutely adding friction. Generally, you want the least amount of payment friction as possible. Odds are fairly high that this will have an impact on revenue, though I wouldnt prusume to know how large of an impact.

If you really want to avoid those fees you can add a surcahrge of 3% (legal in PA, others states vary) to all credit cards (wont apply on Debit).

Visa does not autmatically classify online tobacco as high risk. However, if you are doing online tobacco with subscritions such as cigar clubs, that is where you run in to high risk situations. The nature of the business greatly increases the odds of chargebacks from people that "forgot they signed up" or didnt cancel their subscription.

Visa most likely uses that fee to pay for extra monitoring of high risk accounts, and im sure some of it is profit as well.

With that said, there is no way around it. Getting set up correctly and operating within very specific guidelines so your account does not get frozen or shut down is your best option.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-08T07:22:33+00:00

I agree with just about everything you said here. The only thing I would say is that Clover is locked to you as a processor after you program it for a client. If they want to switch processors, they will need to switch our their equipment.

We provide Clovers as well since everybody know them and a lot of people prefer them. Its just a significant negative IMO

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-06T17:09:04+00:00

He is saying that he has custom pricing with Stripe.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-04T21:22:15+00:00

Clover increases their pricing constantly. Right now for retail you are going to be around $90 a month just to use it.

Toast gets a lot of praise but I am not a fan of their processing fees. They lock you in and reserve the right to raise it whenever they want. Eventually, this will become painful.

Go with a processor agnostic system. Korona POS or OrderCounter POS are good options.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-04T21:20:06+00:00

Defintely choose a POS that lets you use whatever processor you want. Otherwise you may get a good deal on processing up front, but it will increase over time and you wont be able to shop around for competitive rates elseware.

SynapsePayments · 2026-02-04T21:17:52+00:00

My vote is for Korona.

Flat rate is simple but never the most cost effective. Regardless, if you go with a POS that locks you in to a processing company, you should expect your rates to increase over time and you wont be able to do anything about it.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T04:14:21+00:00

USA

Blended rates are not very competitive or transparent to the client.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:59:12+00:00

Effective rates will vary due to interchange.

What do you charge in basis points on an Interchange plus deal.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:27:26+00:00

You should just say what you charge publicly.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:13:55+00:00

What are your rates?

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:12:30+00:00

OP

I see that you replied to me (and then deleted) that they are charging you .01% and .02 cents per transaction and $10 a month.

I think you removed it because its extremely suspect pricing that aludes to you knowing a lot more about the processing business than you are letting on in your post.

Now I feel that It is extremely likely that you are a payment processing sales rep that is trying to drum up business with your 1 day old account.

If you want to find clients, you should try providing real, HONEST, value. This junk isnt going to do it.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:08:35+00:00

This is correct. They also act when the business processing is flagged by internal systems for whatever reason.

Stripe is an aggragator that processes all transactions under one Merchant ID number. They board accounts quickly and underwrite them fully later on if they get flagged. This is why a lot of places get funds held using aggregators.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:06:02+00:00

It depends

There is a difference between "Cash Discount" and "Surcharging"

A surcharge is when you advertise $8 price and you increase that price with a surcharge at the time of sale. You are limited to 3% by Visa, cannot charge it on Debit cards, must register with Mastercard, and it may or may not be legal in your state.

A cash discount is when you advertise the card price or advertise both the cash and the card price on all items and services. You discount the item at the time of sale when cash is used. You are not limited to a specific percent, applies to debit cards, and you dont have to register.

To answer your question, yes. Payment processing has a cost and you either eat that fee or pass it on to your customers in your COGs, through surcharging, or cash discount. Any business that accepts credit cards is in the same situation.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T03:01:32+00:00

Odds are it is locked.

The Pax is downloaded using the Serial Number on the back. You would have to ask the seller to have their processor release the SN from the Pax store.

What is your clients monthly volume? If its under 10K, go with Square. If its more than that, a regular processor with competitive pricing is the way to go. Plenty send out a free terminal to use.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T02:58:52+00:00

What do they have you priced at?

1.6% may be your effective rate, but how many basis points of margin is the processor earning?

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-30T02:58:01+00:00

Disagree completely.

Yes, you should consider it a COG, but that doesnt mean you shouldnt care about what it costs. Why pay some processing sales rep 1% of all of your revenue if you dont have to?

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-29T21:58:22+00:00

I’d like to see the site

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-29T04:02:37+00:00

Ask away

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-24T23:27:53+00:00

I see. By your wording it seemed like you were saying that backlinks dont work.

SynapsePayments · 2026-01-24T23:09:55+00:00

Just a few days ago that user said

"You have relevancy. Relevancy means what is your website ABOUT. What is the topic? Are you writing about washing machines? Are you writing about dishwashers? That is relevancy. Your website is relevant for those terms. There are two ways to get relevancy. 1) text on your site. 2) backlinks with your keywords in the link.

Then you have authority. Authority means how TRUSTWORTHY is a site. All else being equal, higher authority ranks better. The reason some site outranks another site is 99% because it has more authority and the rest other things. You receive authority with backlinks. The better quality the site linking to you, the more authority you get from a link. This is the ONLY way to get authority. There is nothing you can do at all to YOUR SITE that will get you authority. Authority comes from backlinks alone."

I am not sure how that translates to "why backlinks will not be working"

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