The credit repair industry has remarkable potential and a fantastic business model. This industry can help people recover from poor financial decisions and planning, allowing them to remedy poor credit or bad credit, increase their credit scores, and prepare for their financial future.

That being said, the business is unique in many ways, as it often deals with individuals who have financial difficulties and are unable to manage basic financial operations, whether for themselves, their family members, or their businesses. A sad irony is the result: Credit businesses seek to help others recover, but they are often unable to obtain affordable merchant accounts that allow them to do business and process payments.

Not being able to access these critical services means that businesses will struggle to expand or even succeed. As such, you have to make sure that you are working with a merchant account with decades of experience working with high-risk merchants to help them manage their needs and gain access to the financial services they deserve. The unique challenge of this industry necessitates finding ACH processing software that can help you address these issues and properly execute your payment processing.

As a credit repair business, you have unique needs. We’ll work with you to find merchant services to help you grow, no matter which sector of the industry you’re in.

• Cease and desist collections processing
• Credit re-establishment
• Credit repair consultation
• Settlement assistance firms

The Risks Facing the Credit Repair Business

Credit repair is a multibillion-dollar industry, one that has spawned an entire array of businesses that are genuinely dedicated to helping individuals, business owners, startups, and small businesses repair their credit to survive and thrive in today’s economy. All of this can lead to credit repair companies being classified as “high-risk businesses.” This, in turn, can make finding a merchant services vendor even more challenging. These businesses run the gamut of services.

Examples include:

• Collections processing within the cease-and-desist space, working with businesses to help them obtain relief from aggressive collections agencies.
• Re-establishing credit after a financial disaster, a series of poor decisions, or another negative life event.
• Consultation on a variety of credit repair services, including assisting individuals in enrolling in the right services that can help them re-establish their credit.
• Working with settlement assistance firms to help obtain relief from a financial judgment or collect a judgment they are owed.

The provision of these financial services can be risky for the vendors that are involved in collecting payments. Many of these risks are related to chargebacks. These are specific fees that occur when someone disputes or otherwise returns a credit card payment. As a vendor, your business not only loses the money but is often charged an additional fee from the vendor or merchant account processor since it involves additional work on their end. This can result in serious lost revenue.

These chargeback fees make up a vital component of the risk that credit repair businesses often face. For example, the services provided by these businesses are high ticket and involve recurring billing plans. All of this increases the chances of incurring one of these fees and loss to all parties involved. Since individuals who use credit repair services are often cash strapped, they are more likely to lie about certain charges, falsely disputing them, and thus also resulting in additional fees.

Of course, these fees are not the only source of risk to these businesses. Fraud is a problem as well. In many cases, these businesses will take payment via an online portal rather than a mobile device or another form of in-person payment. This increases the chances of fraud, which increases the odds of a payment needing to be returned.

What This Mean For Your Credit Repair Business

This can result in a significant problem for your business and credit repair merchant account. The chief problem is painfully obvious: You may have a hard time obtaining a merchant account, or you may have a difficult time obtaining merchant account services that are affordable.

This may result in you losing a significant chunk of your revenue to credit card processing, cutting into your already thin margins. If you are unable to obtain the appropriate merchant services, it may force you to rely on less-than-ideal methods of completing financial transactions, like cash. This, in turn, can limit your legitimacy with your customers. It can also force you into a position where you have to turn away perfectly valid payment methods, like internet-based transfers.

In this day and age, this is an unacceptable problem for businesses to have to deal with. All of this is ultimately tied back to the exact cause: A credit repair merchant account is considered part of a high-risk industry. As such, you must try and find ways to mitigate these risks. This means finding a vendor who is used to your industry and can handle your needs.

What Merchant Account Services Should You Look For?

When it comes to finding a merchant service, you must identify a business that can provide you with customized services to suit your needs and that fully understands your industry’s unique issues.

This means finding a merchant account service provider that can:

• Confirm customer authorizations for current and future charges.
• Confirm customer identity.
• Provide your business with chargeback protection, ensuring that you are protected against these financial issues that are so common in the credit repair space.
• Provide you with scalable services and fair prices, making sure that your limited resources are well protected.

How Can a Full-Service Merchant Account Help You?

If you are in this business, you already know how difficult it can be to deal with the array of challenges your industry throws at you. This means that you are looking for one-stop shopping and a vendor that can address all of your needs.

So, what needs can we handle for your business?

Here are some examples:

Payments

When it comes to servicing your customers, you have to make sure that you have a payment capacity that meets the needs of the customers you do business with. That means having maximum flexibility with minimal fees. This means that you go where your customer goes, and your merchant account provider has to follow you. Doing so will ensure that you can collect payment from your customers. This means that your merchant account provider must help you get paid in the method of your and your customer’s choosing, regardless of whether that payment comes via mail, in-store, or over a mobile device.

Products

It is essential to work with a merchant account provider that has experience with other high-risk accounts. Furthermore, your merchant account provider must work with various merchant services and payment gateways and offer an array of services that demonstrate their experience in working with credit repair and high-risk businesses like yours. One of the most essential things in the credit repair business is offering flexible products that can meet the needs of customers who are sometimes financially challenged or troubled. Furthermore, within the specific realm of merchant accounts, you have to find services that can be customized to fit your needs.

These include:

• Providing you with the appropriate equipment, including all hardware, software, and point of service devices. Given the unique needs of your industry, POS services can be essential, as the right software can help cut down on fraud that is endemic within your industry. You must have the right digital services, such as managing the application process to ensure that you can have access to financial institutions, as well as their virtual terminals.
• ACH processing. ACH stands for automatic clearing house, and it is the process by which automatic payments travel between banks. Getting the right services that can actively fit your needs is vital in the credit repair industry, as it can help limit your fees, provide you with an efficient fee basis, and limit unnecessary fees. Furthermore, your merchant service provider must also take care of more run-of-the-mill services like accepting payments, managing account approval, reducing chargeback ratios, and identifying other payment solutions.
• Integration support with your other financial services, including online banking system, record-keeping, and website. You should find a provider who can manage any high-volume payment processor, like Stripe or PayPal. On an as-needed basis, you should also have access to credit reports, processing history, additional information on merchant account providers, and e-commerce solutions.
• Surcharge and cash discount processing. This means that you must have access to a system that ensures your surcharges are kept to a minimum and that any cash can be processed in a manner that results in a discount to you in terms of your transaction fees.
• Check and e-check processing. As anyone in the credit repair industry undoubtedly understands, your customers often will not have access to financial services that other businesses take for granted. This includes credit cards and debit cards. As a result, you may spend a good portion of your time managing check and e-check processing. This means that you will have to use merchant services that can provide you a fair price on these fees, all while also ensuring that this processing integrates with the other financial services that you provide.
• Gift card and loyalty card processing. As any vendor knows, processing gift cards or loyalty cards — and integrating them into your overall financial services system — can be an accounting and logistical nightmare. As such, you have to find a business that has years of experience in operating these programs and can help your business do just that.

Other Services

More often than not, a credit repair merchant will need more than just merchant account services for your credit repair operation. Your life will be much easier if you can identify a vendor who can give you one-stop shopping, ensuring that your individual needs can be met. Other services you should look for include:

• Capital provision
• ATM access, including installation, management, processing, and security
• EBT management for businesses that are engaged in providing Electronic Benefit Transfer services.
• Account manager services

Experience Matters

Experience matters when it comes to high-risk accounts. Your vendor must be someone who doesn’t just work with credit repair companies but a variety of other accounts that have been deemed to be very risky by banks and credit card companies. This matters because high-risk businesses have many factors in common, regardless of the specifics of that business.

Remember, the high-risk field is about so much more than just credit repair companies. It also includes businesses like adult merchants, CBD merchants, payday loan lenders, and more. These are all relatively risky fields and have heavier-than-normal risks of fraud, potential thorny legal issues, and more. As such, you should find a business that understands how to manage high-risk accounts.

Your credit repair business needs and deserves merchant account processing services that suit the unique needs of your industry. We can provide those services at Zenti based on our years of expertise and client portfolio that stretches into your industry.