There are lots of different ways to get paid online, and if you're not careful you can end up spending a lot more than you need to.
Gravity Forms allows integration with PayPal, PayPal Payments Pro, Stripe and Authorize.net. Here's a quick breakdown of each payment gateway to help you choose the best way for you to accept payments on your website.
When selecting a payment gateway, here are some things to consider:
Monthly Transaction Volume
All the per transaction fees are the same across the board, but both PayPal's fees decrease as your sales volume increases unlike the other options.
- $0 to $3,000 monthly: 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction
- $3,000 to $10,000 monthly: 2.5% + $0.30 per transaction
- $10,000 to $100,000 monthly: 2.2% + $0.30 per transaction
SSL Certificates
An SSL certificate encrypts your customer's credit card information when its sent off to be processed. If you're sending your customers to PayPal to complete the transaction, then you don't need to purchase an additional security certificate. But if your customer is entering their card info on your site as they will with PayPal Payments Pro, Authorize.net and Stripe, you need an SSL, and it can cost you upwards of $150 annually.
Monthly Fees
Both PayPal Payments Pro and Authorize.net have monthly fees, whereas Stripe does not, however, Stripe's percentage doesn't decrease as your sales increase, so keep that in mind when choosing a gateway.
Subscriptions and Memberships
Even though standard PayPal is the cheapest option, but you don't get the ability to process payments on your site and you can't do recurring payments for subscription or membership sites.
When You Get Paid
Cash flow is important – and each option pays differently. Make sure you're okay with the payment terms when choosing a gateway. The soonest Stripe pays you 7 days after the order, so anything you sold on January 1 would be paid to you on January 8. Authorize.net pays your bank account the fastest, and PayPal's fund are immediately available in PayPal but it takes 3-5 days to transfer to your bank account.
