ALTO GLOBAL PROCESSING: WHAT IS A MERCHANT ACCOUNT?

Alto Global Processing - For a company that wishes to accept payments via credit cards, it is required that the company obtains a merchant account. Regardless of the sector of business your organization operates in, private merchant accounts is the processing vehicle. Merchant accounts can be issued by both domestic and foreign banking solutions. Keep in mind that each bank and the geographical region your team is operating in may have specific regulations to consider for operating a merchant account.

Please visit Alto Global Processing at http://altoglobalprocessing.com

MerchantBilling Shows New Processing Power at XBIZ Summit by Lyla Katz

LOS ANGELES — Premier processing company Merchant Billing is gearing up to expand the reach of its operations within the adult industry and will be participating in next week’s highly anticipated XBIZ Summit in Chicago as a Gold Sponsor from June 10-12.

The Merchant Billing hospitality suite will be open for all tradeshow attendees to learn how to bill more efficiently and earn better profit margins with MerchantBilling.com.

"We're excited to be a central part of the XBIZ Chicago event and look forward to meeting with decision-makers face to face," said Barry Hotson, vice president of business development for MerchantBilling.com.

"In this new era of online commerce, having a verifiable level of trust and personal contact with the companies you do business with is an essential element of long-term success.

“Merchant Billing offers clients innovative new processing technologies and a long track record of trust. You can drop in to meet us informally when you arrive or set up a scheduled meeting ahead of time to guarantee any particular time slot."

Merchant Billing said it is evolving the tools that merchants rely upon. The processing and fraud prevention tools currently being used by many major merchants are surprisingly outdated, the company said. That means many companies are earning less than they could be due to slow statistical analysis, inadequate consumer screening and other obstacles which can be overcome with a more advanced billing system in place.

“Merchant Billing provides rock solid reliability and speed in one powerful package of processing solutions,” the company said.

Merchant Billing said it offers a proprietary next generation PCI compliant gateway, with fully customizable billing rules and smart processing parameters, enabling its clients to maximize revenues, the company added.

The new platform with customizable KPI's and 24/7 fully-integrated support from experienced industry agents also allows clients to improve member retention.

Clients can access a statistics package, customizable metrics and get behavioral analysis with A/B testing capabilities.

Merchant Billing also integrates clients’ affiliate program functionality with Smart Ad technology, detailed metrics and a wide array of customizable program options.

Alto Global Processing Launches

MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — Alto Global Processing has announced the official launch of the company.
The company said the team was formed by combining the strengths of three entities including technology, banking and operational partners.
Alto Global Processing specializes in the issuing of private merchant services and gateway services in the high-risk merchant sector of the online payment processing space.
The management team of Alto Global Processing said it had monitored and reviewed the state of the online billing industry and is confident that its business model will enable the company to be competitive due to the team's experience, banking relationships and access to sophisticated technology.
"The entire online adult industry has rapidly evolved over the past two years in a manner that makes the business environment more challenging than ever," CEO Luca Bizzotto said.
"Along with an increase in affiliate programs competing, decrease in quality webmasters and access to free content, the credit card association has become more savvy with policing merchants who continue to be overly aggressive and ultimately forcing bank closures due to fraudulent practices. So, to combat these trends, Alto Global Processing has taken a unique approach to solidifying their position as a banking partner to merchants.
The company said that in order to service merchants by offering them private merchant accounts, Alto Global Processing is dedicated to seeking banking relationships where there is true investment into the bank.
"More specifically, Alto Global Processing’s banking portfolio consists of banks that are not saturated with typical adult clients," the company said.
"This minimizes the risk in associating Alto Global Processing merchants with those merchants who continue to be overly aggressive. Furthermore, Alto Global Processing seeks their preferred banking relationships to be premised on an ownership into the banking BIN and/or has an exclusive relationship with the bank and/or can directly underwrite merchants."
The company said Alto Global Processing's bank investment becomes more beneficial for clients and merchants in the ability to offer competitive rates, turn applications around in a quicker manner, to see the ‘big picture’ of a merchant, and to have more control in ensuring the merchant processes at its highest potential.
The company said this philosophy extends to Alto Global Processing gateway services. The team owns the code behind the platform giving clients access to custom services, discounted fees and customer service.
For more information, contact info@AltoGlobalProcessing.com.

The State of Merchant Banking by By Steve Bryson and Dan Steinberg

Rest assured: Now more than ever, we believe there are excellent choices for merchants to obtain quality merchant account and payment processing solutions. One fact that can describe these times is that the payment industry is more regulated than ever, which may seem problematic to some, but in truth, creates more stability.
The payment industry has matured in the way it is able to service the adult industry, and today there are more ways than ever for merchants to reliably accept payment and convert their traffic into revenue. There may be hiccups that occur from time to time, like in any industry, potentially affecting adult merchants in some way. Any industry is subject to being affected by outside circumstances, such as effects from the mortgage industry meltdown.
For example, word of the FDIC’s role as the new majority owner of Humboldt Merchant Services emerged in August just as we were asked to comment in this article on the current state of banking and payments for adult merchants. HMS’s president, Ken Musante, assured all in a brief online announcement and on a personal call to Steve Bryson as well, that HMS’s customers will continue to receive uninterrupted payment processing.
Musante and the other professionals running HMS know their business, and we are confident that they will continue to be a reliable long-term provider of merchant account services to the adult industry. Whether it is here in the states — through a Merrick ISO, HMS, or another bank that might be taking adult business, or offshore in Europe or another region, be assured of this — there are very good solutions for “high-risk adult” merchant accounts. There are also excellent solutions out there for mobile billing, for ACH and Check21, for country specific bank debit, and for other alternative forms of billing.
Webmasters today want to be able to convert their U.S. traffic and their non-U.S. traffic at the best possible rates. Experienced payment industry professionals can help merchants wade through the choices and avoid mistakes when considering these payment options.
Along these lines, on July 24 the Merchant Card Information Reporting Requirement was signed into law and made part of the Housing Rescue and Foreclosure Prevention Act also known as H.R. 3221. This Act stipulates that all acquirers will be responsible in the coming year for reporting merchants that process more than 200 transactions and/or $20,000 annually to the Internal Revenue Service. The intent of this part of the bill is a further attempt in our opinion, to capture revenue to offset the enormous deficit.
The requirement for reporting under this legislature falls solely onto the acquirer. One byproduct of this is that the time for companies engaged in the merchant processing business by operating unregistered aggregation accounts, has come and passed. We can expect to see acquirers being even more careful now when underwriting new merchant accounts.
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency implores acquiring banks to perform extensive due diligence in an attempt to reduce fraud risk. This mere fact combined with the fast-approaching reporting requirements by acquirers is sure to shine the spotlight on many companies that were operating under the radar. They have also suggested further restrictions on all new and existing entities wishing to become Independent Sales Organizations (ISOs). It is our belief that the recent climate within financial institutions may put smaller ISOs that lack reporting capabilities as well as certain banks, out of business.
As we all know, there has been a proliferation of offshore companies operating in just the manner described above (unregistered aggregation). If they are not shut down by their acquirers, many of these will begin to experience difficulties due to decreased sales thereby inflating chargeback ratios. Merchants need to be careful of this, ask questions of their processors if they are uncertain how the processor is operating, and reach out to professional ISO organizations servicing the adult industry for assistance, if they have any doubts.
Be assured, the current state of the banking industry is not doom and gloom. There are highly qualified, registered ISOs and third-party billing companies geared to provide quality merchant account solutions here in the U.S. or offshore, for either individual accounts or IPSP accounts. They are registered with the card associations and have the sense of mind to balance their highrisk volume vs. retail merchant volume. These are the companies that merchants need to be working with to insure stability and continued growth opportunity with their businesses.
As we stated initially, there are still very good choices for individual merchant accounts and processing solutions both in the U.S. and abroad. In today’s banking environment, more so than in recent years, merchants are opting for their own merchant accounts, while many continue to opt for accounts at an IPSP.
That dynamic will probably never change. Is it the “best of times” or “the worst of times” in banking for adult? While more regulated than ever, we feel that these are very good times in terms of the quality of merchant account and payment processing opportunities available.




Steve Bryson and Dan Steinberg are veterans of internet payment processing. Bryson is CEO of Global Electronic Technology Inc., a leading ISO in the U.S. credit card services industry and has long serviced the adult merchant community. Steinberg has worked with many of the top programs in the industry on their payment solutions for more than a decade. At the Phoenix Forum this year, longtime friends Bryson and Steinberg co-launched a new company, Orbitalpay LLC, a hybrid PSP designed for the adult industry.