Accept online payments securely with Genome*

Businesses that sell merchandise and/or services through the Internet should know about accepting and processing credit card payments online. As there’s no face-to-face interaction between you and a customer, the process differs. For one, a merchant needs a website to show the products available. There, they will set up a checkout form to receive payments. The customer, in turn, will need to fill in the checkout form with their payment method details to complete the purchase. Firstly, a payment gateway encrypts the customer’s data, and the transaction is sent to the payment processor of a shop owner. The processor then sends it to the card company to verify that everything is correct. The card network then sends it to the client’s issuing bank. The issuer allows or denies the transaction, depending on whether there is enough money in the client’s account. If the transaction is a success, the money for the purchase will be transferred to the merchant’s account within a couple of days once the transaction is processed.

You can accept online card payments if you own a physical shop or a store through which you sell online. In the case of the former, you will need to open a bank account and get the equipment necessary to read the credit card data: a terminal and Point-of-sale software. In the case of online payments, as described before, you will need a website with a checkout form and a merchant account to accept money from your customer’s credit cards. You can also use a marketplace or an e-commerce platform if you don’t want to build your website from the ground up. You can still start a merchant account within Genome if you use one of the platforms that we have an integration with.

You can accept online payments the same way as was described before — by starting a website or using an e-commerce platform and using a payment service provider to start a merchant account and get paid for your goods and services.

Since online payments lack face-to-face interaction, it is easier for scammers to pretend they are someone else and use stolen data for fraudulent transactions. That’s why there are ways to make online payments safer. For one, all the companies and institutions that deal with credit card information need to comply with the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS). It allows protecting the client’s credit card data from misuse. Merchants and payment service providers from the EU should follow the requirements of the Revisited Payment Services Directive (PSD2). One of the main demands is strong customer authentication when dealing with electronic payments. The SCA means the cardholder has to identify themselves by a minimum of 2 out of 3 criteria. These are passwords, an OTP, biometric data, etc. This reduces the likelihood of customer’s data being used for fraudulent transactions. Genome adds to the security of our clients by providing services of the Covery anti-fraud platform. With it, you can manage risks and prevent chargebacks.