Health and Beauty Merchant Account

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"This company was wonderful to work with. The representative I worked with was an amazing help and had constant support and responded rapidly to any questions or concerns I had."

Gabe Palma

CEO of Musty Inc.

The health and beauty industry is a multi-billion dollar business juggernaut. It contains an array of business categories, including salons, haircare, skincare, and much, much more. The beauty business now sells an almost mind-boggling array of creams, supplements, and more. As the beauty business has expanded, so have the options that consumers have at their disposal when it comes to where they can make a purchase. If you are involved in this business type, you fully understand just how competitive it is—but also how rewarding it can be.

However, like all businesses, the health and beauty industry has some challenges that are unique to its interests. One such example is finding a credit card payment processor that can handle the needs of individuals within this business space. For a variety of reasons, it can be difficult to open health and beauty merchant accounts, and other card processing solutions are often hard to come by. This means that processing credit cards or online payments can be difficult, more expensive, or outright impossible. In a health and beauty business model, this is not acceptable. Virtually no business is cash only these days, and this industry is no exception.

Merchant processing is necessary for the health and beauty business. This means that you may have to explore alternative options. Opening a high-risk payment gateway is something that a high-risk business may need to do.

Despite these obstacles, owners of beauty businesses can still set up health and beauty merchant accounts. You’ll have to look for a specialized payment processor. This likely means that you’ll have to find someone who has explicitly worked with high-risk payment accounts. Zenti has years of experience working with these types of accounts and will be able to fulfill any payment processing and credit card processing needs you may have. As industry leaders in the payment processing solutions world, you can expect to be able to rely on Zenti to solve your high-risk payment processing needs, provide you with POS equipment, and ensure that you will be accepting payments from customers that want to do business with you.

What Does the High-Risk Classification Mean?

It means more money, time, and hassle for your business.

A high-risk classification means that a merchant account provider believes your business has a higher-than-average risk of fraud or chargebacks occurring. Chargebacks are when a card on a chargeback is reversed. This may happen for a variety of reasons. A chargeback means lost revenue for you, but it also means additional costs to your credit card provider.

The burdens that come with a high-risk classification include:

Processing Fees: Every time a credit card is charged, there is a processing fee that must be paid by the merchant in question. A high-risk account will have to pay a higher processing fee. This is done to offset the risk to the credit card processor.
Chargeback Fees: Chargeback fees are normal for any line of business. They are higher for high-risk accounts.
Additional Records: You’ll need to supply a payment processor with a variety of records, regardless of if you are low risk or high risk. You’ll likely have to supply additional records if you are high-risk. This includes credit history, bank statements, past payment processing history, and more.
Higher Reserves: A payment processor will deposit any money you are entitled to into your bank account. They may keep a small percentage of that money as a cash reserve to protect against any loss incurred by chargebacks. High-risk accounts will have higher cash reserves.
Volume caps: Volume caps are normal in the processing industry. They are viewed as protection against the risk that comes with credit card processing. You may face volume caps. These caps can occur in the total amount of transactions, or the total cost of the transactions.

What Businesses May Need Health and Beauty Merchant Accounts?

Many businesses could use this type of account. It includes:

Salons or hair care operations
Nutrition stores, including stores that sell supplements and related products
Tanning salons
CBD vendors
Nutraceuticals
Skincare products
Freelance hair or makeup artists
Nail salon
Esthetician
Selling makeup as part of an MLM operation, such as with Mary Kay or Avon

Why Are Health and Beauty Merchant Accounts Considered High Risk?

It’s important to understand why health and beauty merchant accounts are considered high risk. If you have a good understanding of why this is the case, you may be able to alter your business practices to reduce the risk associated with your health and beauty merchant accounts.

High chargebacks: Beauty products tend to have high chargebacks. There are many reasons for this, but it’s typically associated with high claims and the inability of many products to meet such claims.
Reputational issues: Beauty products have a bad tendency of making grandiose claims and then being unable to deliver on these claims. Furthermore, some health and beauty products claim to be able to do certain things—like remove pain or help people lose weight—and then not meet those promises. This results in dissatisfied customers, and this results in chargebacks.
Subscription-based problems: Many health and beauty products operate on a subscription-based model. This model tends to be associated with high-risk products, as people will often seek refunds for subscriptions that they either don’t remember seeking or no longer want.

Does This Apply to All Facets of the Beauty Industry?

Yes.

The issues noted above impact many different subsections of the health and beauty industry. You may practice haircare, skincare, tanning, salons, or more. This category also includes businesses that have less reputable reputations, including those that sell nutraceuticals or CBD.

Ultimately, this is irrelevant: A payment processor is still likely to classify you as a high-risk business if you sell products in this category.

This is also the case if you have a brick-and-mortar store or if you manage online stores. In many cases, having an online store can increase the risk that your business may incur. This is because of the high amount of card-not-present transactions. A card-not-present transaction is what occurs when someone uses their credit card to make a purchase, but the vendor doesn’t physically see the card. This increases the likelihood of fraud, as it’s harder to verify the identity of the card owner. If there is a fraudulent charge, it increases the chances of a chargeback being incurred by the merchant account provider. This will increase your high-risk classification issues, and payment processing companies will eventually classify your business as high risk.

What Services Do Health and Beauty Merchant Accounts Need?

These factors increase the pressure on businesses that are seeking to open health and beauty merchant accounts. These businesses will have to look much harder to find the services that they are seeking. They will need to find processors who are experienced in dealing with high-risk merchant accounts and have worked extensively with high-risk industries.

When it comes to payment processing, there is no shortage of needs. Companies like Zenti are built to fulfill your various processing options and ensure you have access to the services that will enable you to process payments.

Can your high-risk payment processor handle processing credit cards? Do they have online payment options, and can these options easily be installed into your website to ensure that you can process credit cards or use other payment services? That last item is particularly important, as traditional credit cards are being used less and less in payments. More people are shifting to a variety of other highly flexible payment options. This includes services like Stripe, Venmo, PayPal, and more. Even if you only have a brick-and-mortar store, you should make sure that you find payment options that can handle this growing area of payment processing.

If you have a brick-and-mortar store, you’ll need a high-risk merchant processor who has worked in retail locations. This means that you’ll need a processor who can help you with a low-cost or no-cost set-up and be on-call whenever you are open. This is vital: Your business can’t stop if a piece of equipment breaks, and you must have access to payment processing tools and 24/7 customer service.

You should also fully understand the costs of processing, and if your merchant account provider offers items such as high-risk protection. Some merchants, like Zenti, offer zero-cost processing tools. This allows the costs of processing to be passed along to customers and folded into your total price. This can be successful for some merchants and many have found it to be a viable method of covering costs associated with credit card processing.

You also have to keep an eye on the future. At the moment, credit card and online payment processing tools are what your business will most likely need when it comes to collecting payments from your customers. The future may change this, and the rise of cryptocurrency means that your business may need to consider adding these payments in the future. Most health and beauty businesses do not actively need this payment processing method—yet—but may in the future. You should make sure that your payment processor has an eye on future payment collection methods and will be able to serve you should the need arise.

There are also payment options that extend beyond credit cards, online payment methods, or crypto. ACH payment has become a fast and reliable way of allowing customers to make payments directly from their bank. Your business may need to consider the addition of ACH payment options to appeal to a segment of customers that prefers making payments in this manner.

What Other Services Does My Health and Beauty Business Need?

The above services are the basics that any high-risk payment processor should be looking for. However, you’re going to need more than that to survive in a highly competitive business world.

Among the more important services your business may need are options for integration. This integration means many things:

Website: Any payment processor must easily integrate with your website. This means that setting up a payment processor may be as easy as copy and pasting a line of code onto your website. Some websites or apps may need customer-created software or applications. If this is the case, your payment processor must have the expertise on staff that allows you to manage these options.
Accounting software: Your payment processor must easily integrate with whatever account and tax software you have. This is necessary to reduce your workload and make sure that you are easily and accurately able to pay any taxes owed.
Already existing gateways: Your business may have already set up a variety of payment accounts on numerous services. If this is the case, a payment processor should be able to easily integrate with your already existing accounts.

Finally, it’s worth considering how a payment processor can help you market. A payment processor should be able to provide you with contact information on your customers, including addresses, phone numbers, and Email addresses. This should allow you to expand your potential marketing options and give customers a chance to learn more about your business.

At the end of the day, you’ll need to ensure that you find a merchant account provider with experience in the area of health and beauty merchant accounts. Zenti has ample experience in working with a slew of high-risk merchant accounts, including health and beauty merchant account providers. If you are interested in learning more about Zenti and the services they may be able to offer you, contact us today.

Integrations

Zenti Connect plays nice with others

Zenti Connect integrates seamlessly with ISV software to simplify payment processing for merchants: any payment type, on any device, anywhere.

Zenti integrates with over 99% of the tools you are already using, including popular accounting software and e-commerce apps, regardless of your industry. Our payment services were designed to be adaptable to provide seamless integrations for our customers.

Ecommerce Integrations

BigCommerce
Formsite
Infusionsoft
Keap
Magento
Microsoft Dynamics
Network Solutions
SalesForce
Shopify
Volusion
Web.com
Weebly
WIX
WooCommerce
WordPress
Yola

WordPress Plugin Integrations

Cart66
Checkfront
EASYCART
eShop
Event Espresso
events manager
GetShopped.org
GRAVITY
Jigoshop
Paid Memberships Pro
Shopp
SHOPPERPRESS
templatic
TheCartPress
WishList MEMBER
WooCommerce
WORDPRESS eSTORE
WP GATEWAYS
WpInvoice
wpmudev

Drupal Plugin Integrations

Drupal Commerce
Ubercart

Joomla Plugin Integrations

HikaShop
Miwisoft
VirtueMart

Retail POS Integrations

911 Software, Inc.
ACR Systems
Activant
Aldelo Systems, Inc.
Applied Micro Technology
Advanced Retail Management Solutions (ARMs)
Auto star
Cantaloupe Systems
Data Business Systems
Datacap Systems, Inc.
DataTech Corp
DataVantage
Edgil Associates
Elavon*
Epicor (CRS, NSB)
Freedom Pay
Gateway Ticketing Systems
Idalica Corp
IJN Systems
IT Retail
KWI
Main Street Softworks
MBS Textbook Exchange
Medasyst, Inc.
Microsoft
/n Software, Inc.
PC America
POSiFlex
RATEX Business Solutions
Retail Data Systems
RTL Payment Systems
ScanSource, Inc.
Sicom Systems, Inc.
Slim CD
Tempus Technologies
Tender Retail Systems
The Software Mills
Tomax Corporation
Total Computing Solutions
TouchNet Information Systems
XProtean, Inc. (C-Payment Software)
XPient Solutions
Vista Entertainment Systems

Restaurant and Quick Serve Integrations

911 Software, Inc.
Data Business Systems
Dinerware
Datacap Systems, Inc.
Main Street Softworks
Menusoft Systems Corp.
Micros Systems
Midnite Express, Inc.
/n Software Inc.
NCR
onePOS.com
Ordyx
Radiant Systems
Revel Systems
Sicom Systems, Inc.
Squirrel Systems
Tempus Technologies
XPient Solutions
XProtean, Inc. (C-Payment Software)
Elavon (previously Southern DataComm and Global Card Services)

Gas Station and Petroleum Integrations

Dresser Wayne
Excentus
Fuel Links
Fiscal Systems, Inc.
Gilbarco
LOC Software
Main Street Softworks
Petro RX
PetroVend
Radiant Systems
Retalix
VeriFone Ruby System

Supermarket POS Integrations

Datacap Systems
JPMA
LOC Software
Logivision
MTX/EPS
RORC
StoreNext
Torex

Travel and Entertainment Integrations

911 Software, Inc.
Hotel Software Systems
Slim CD
Elavon
Tempus Technologies

Government Integrations

Government organizations face a growing need for secure payment processing services while managing highly specific needs for content management and security.

We can work with popular technology products government agencies prefer, like Ciber and Cubic, to create an integrated solution that meets all your needs for processing payments, managing information, and more.

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We partnered with Zenti in 2017 and they've been there for us every time. Everything is super fast and I love how well they communicate with our staff. They really know their stuff, and we work in a very complex industry! My account executive knows our business inside and out.
Alexandria, CMO