What is acquiring and what are its advantages?

In the modern world it is difficult to imagine a settlement system without the use of plastic cards. Often, this method is much more convenient than paying for goods, services and making various payments in cash. Today it is not necessary to carry large sums of money (and in most cases you can do without them at all) to make some purchase (from a chocolate bar to an air ticket or a car), pay an invoice in a restaurant or make a monthly utility payment. All this can be done with only one bank card. It is accepted by most shops, restaurants, organizations to provide all kinds of services. They realize the possibility of paying for their goods / services by card through the use of acquiring. This article is devoted to this concept. What is acquiring and what are its advantages for each participant in the calculation?

This service is provided by banks to commercial and other organizations by installing payment terminals on their territory (otherwise they are called pos-terminals), as well as imprinters. They are designed to read information from the card and invoice the buyer / customer. The acquirer bank receives a request and writes off the appropriate amount of money from the client's account. Operations on plastic cards are processed in the processing center of the bank. Based on the reports received daily, the bank reimburses the enterprise (to its current account), in which the terminal is installed, cash funds for the amount of all operations performed on this equipment. Bank acquiring brings a good income to the credit organization in the form of commission for making such calculations. So, for her it's a good way to earn.

And what is acquiring for the organization? Does it make sense to use this system if part of the cost of a product or service has to be given to a bank? Of course, he is, and not small. The fact is that this is an excellent opportunity to attract additional customers / customers, who prefer to pay with a card, not a cache. As a rule, they do not carry significant amounts of money, and the absence of a pos-terminal in the organization can lead to a refusal to buy (often buyers do not return for a purchase or another operation, but find a place where they can easily accept payment by a card). Thus, acquiring (whose tariffs are not so significant for the company) allows expanding the customer base and increasing sales up to 30%.

There are other advantages of using this banking service. So, the company will always be insured from accepting counterfeit bills in payment for goods or services, and will also save on cash collection . And, of course, it will make more convenient the calculations of customers who do not have enough cash, but always carry a plastic card.

And what is acquiring on the Internet? Almost the same, but in virtual space. It is used for payment from the card account of purchases in online stores, as well as in the implementation of a number of electronic payments (mobile phone replenishment, utilities, taxes, etc.). It is implemented using the web-interface and also allows the bank to earn on the provision of such intermediary services.

There is one more option of this type of service. What is acquiring when using an ATM? In this case, this procedure refers to withdrawing cash from a bank card by a person who is not a customer of the credit institution to which the device belongs. The client here is the same as the service provider: the first is the card issuer, the second is the owner of the ATM (acquirer).