Many businesses in the United States and abroad have applied for merchant accounts within the last three to five years due, mostly in part by the inundation of new ecommerce businesses. With these new businesses starting up and performing maintenance on banks and processors current customers, set up and integration lead times have become longer. High volume, high capacity merchant accounts have become very popular among ecommerce merchants, especially; the internet boom sees no slow down in sight and the ability to get big and very quickly leaves new merchants with little choice but to apply for these high volume accounts from the inception of their business. The thought of a new business being granted a high volume merchant account is a new concept. Traditionally, businesses need to show an upward trend in sales, along with a proven track record of stability and low chargeback’s to be granted a processing limit increase.

Today, many merchants are turning to banks and processors overseas for their credit card processing needs. International banks in recent years have become aggressive to gain business by offering high volume merchant accounts to new and young companies that wish to achieve high volume status from inception. The term seven days or less is a reality; processors and merchant service providers or brokers see the opportunity to enable new and young merchants to achieve high volume processing status and fill the gaps that a lot of banks cannot by funneling in business to their banks. This new way of setting up merchant accounts is proving itself to be a win win situation for the banks, processors and merchant service providers.

Essentially, using a broker to prequalify customers and handle the brunt of the paperwork takes a tremendous load off of the processors and banks by handing them a willing and competent merchant. From the time a new customer’s application and documents are processed, integration and processing can take about three or four days; making a seven day window absolutely feasible. From the time a new customer is integrated, their merchant service provider’s job isn’t done. Through a merchant’s processing cycle, questions and issues always rear their heads; while they don’t offer all of the answers, a merchant service provider is a great tool and definitely the right, “first call” for a merchant to make, especially when dealing with chargeback’s.

Having a high volume merchant account doesn’t mean that your account will always have a high limit. This is a little known fact that most banks and processors don’t disclose. Domestic banks offer high limit accounts and will even raise limits under the right circumstances; however if they see a lot of chargeback’s or the merchant isn’t using their account to the limit, that limit will decrease. Offshore banks typically won’t be so quick to judge an account in the short term. There is no proper or better protocol when dealing with these types account issues, just different rules for different banks. If you do have or wish to know more about how to obtain a high volume merchant account, contact a merchant service provider.