
Half a year with FastSpring payment processor - grayprog
http://blog.apparentsoft.com/business/227/half-a-year-with-fastspring-payment-processor/
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acangiano
We've been using FastSpring for ThinkCode.TV since day one. They are a very
good choice.

In my opinion, their main weaknesses are:

* Relatively expensive if you sell low priced items like we do (there is a $0.75 transaction minimum).

* Their anti-fraud algorithm requires customers to complete a huge form before allowing a purchase. This has been, in my experience, a major turn-off for customers.

* No support for recurring billing.

* Their upload applet is a nightmare if you are uploading large files like we do (e.g., 150+ Mb files). Transactions fail all the time.

Other than that, they are a good choice.

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kenfastspring
Hope you won't mind the comments here:

Regarding the huge form, while I know you'd like smaller, I would like to say
it is pretty standard for online purchases. Name, Address info, phone in some
cases, and email address.

Recurring billing is coming.

The upload applet works great for most, but I agree some have problems with
it. The real reason things have moved beyond just simple FTP is that files
aren't hosted on simple servers any longer. When things move to cloud
computing, adding a file to the cloud is much more complex than the old days
of just FTP'ing it into a directory. While we are continuing to work to make
it better, anytime a client does have problems, we are quick with some other
options, including we can pull the files down and load them for you.

Ken White, Chief Customer Service Officer FastSpring E-Commerce

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acangiano
> Hope you won't mind the comments here:

I appreciate them. :)

> Regarding the huge form, while I know you'd like smaller, I would like to
> say it is pretty standard for online purchases. Name, Address info, phone in
> some cases, and email address.

I agree for CC processing. However, for PayPal orders, people expect a quick
payment. AFAIK our PayPal customers still need to fill in all the info.

> Recurring billing is coming.

Awesome. This will allow us to implement a better business model.

> anytime a client does have problems, we are quick with some other options,
> including we can pull the files down and load them for you.

I can attest that you've usually been helpful when it came to performing
operations on S3 for us. Direct access to S3 (for technical users like us)
would really be beneficial though.

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maxklein
I'll say one thing about FastSpring - you can use them like a highly
intelligent robot. Instead of going to their panel, I'd send emails like:

"I'd like a source code option on product x, and it should be for free with
variation y, and should look like x"

In 15 mins you get a cheerful "No Problem", and 30 minutes later: "All Done."

I used to feel guilty asking them to do this for me instead of doing it
myself, but then I realised that that's why I was sticking with them.

Their prices are not high compared to the competition, and the handle all the
stuff you should do (like VAT).

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olegk
| 5.9% plus $.95 per transaction or a flat rate of 8.9%

Wow, that's very expensive. I'd prefer PayPal or Google Checkout.

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grayprog
Once again, you get a lot of services for the price. If you only need to
accept paymemts and you handle all the rest yourself, plus you don't need a
good, personal customer service (PayPal and Google's service are not good at
all), then PP or GC are a better choice for you.

Plus GC only works in the US. Maybe UK. There's rest of the world as well.

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olegk
Your profit margins must be insane if you can afford to give 6% of your
earnings away for some glorified credit card processing.

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corbet
I'm all for great customer service, but 6-9% discount rates are frightening.
It's not that hard to do direct paypal/credit card processing for something in
the 2.5-4% range. That's a big chunk of a company's revenue, not to be given
up lightly.

~~~
grayprog
That's hard or simply impossible if you're not in US/UK.

Also, even in the US, you'll need to build a lot of code on your site to
support all the options that FastSpring and other similar services provide,
such as all the offers, discounts, cross-sales etc. It's possible to do and
maybe even more integrated, but still it's additional work that needs to be
done and maintained.

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cjy
I've been using FastSpring on my site for about 4 months. Customer support is
indeed great. I sell software and I like that they have file fulfillment
services. After a certain number of downloads/days the link stops working
cutting back on piracy. I could code this all myself, but it would take time
and it would be a headache to deal with email. Also, I really like how there
is no monthly fee. This makes FastSpring ideal for testing new products albeit
a little more expensive than alternatives in the long run.

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mronge
I'll also highly recommend FastSpring, their customer service has been
phenomenal and the store features have saved me loads of time.

You'd be crazy to try and build a store like it yourself. Instead, go with
FastSpring and spend the time you've saved on your product.

