SECURITY FEATURES OF FREE MERCHANT ACCOUNT

For any medium sized and small businesses, the merchants would want to get a free merchant account. But the point lies in selecting the ones which are really effective from others that are found in market or internet.

Generally all the service providers of free merchant account offer numerous freebies which could be free setup, free application fee or free terminal. Irrespective of free offers the merchant will have to focus on business service, cost effective and security features of merchant account. The security measures which are adopted by service providers must protect the merchants from dubious and fraudulent transactions. As several billion dollars are lost annually to ecommerce criminals and more often the small merchants would feel its effect.

In order to stop the fraudulent transactions there are three ways which are often adopted by free merchant account service providers namely: Address Verification Service, Card Security Number Confirmation and 3D Secure Code.

Address Verification Service (AVS): This security service is very much helpful to internet business entrepreneurs. Especially for the transactions classified under card-not-present, the customers need to provide his billing address which will be verified against billing address saved on files of card issuer. In case if the addresses don’t match the system will give automatic response code to merchant and then he decides whether to continue or stop the transaction.

Card Security Number Confirmation (CVV2): MasterCard had developed this security service where CVV2 is a digital code consisting of three codes which is imprinted on MasterCard’s (over signature panel). The business entrepreneur can verify it in real time whether the consumer has actual and valid card for transactions. These digital codes are not stored by business owners because for the security purposes of customers.

3D Secure code: This Extensible Mark-up Language (XML) protocol was first developed by Visa, a credit card company and later it was adopted by MasterCard. In this protocol, the card will have a password which will be known only to customer and he can transact only if correct password is entered or else the transaction will be declined.

In addition to above mentioned security features, there are several tips that merchants can use to reduce the fraudulent transactions like:

Before shipping it is best advised for merchant to call-up the customer and verify the details regarding the order. Generally the fraudsters will order several items and can’t keep a track of their online purchase or won’t remember any information they would have given during transaction.

Merchants need to keep an eye on purchasing patterns of customers; any sudden changes should be take care immediately.

Make a note of business service or product which is more prone to fraudulent transactions.

Merchants need to store the transaction receipts safely.

The business entrepreneurs need to make an effort towards securing their transaction and with help of advanced security features adopted by service providers; each and every merchant can avoid fraudulent transactions. When choosing a service provider the merchant needs to ensure that he is getting a service which enhances his business, revenue, productivity and security.