Epoch and CCBill VISA fee

[jaroq]

Hi All,

I'm starting up a membership site after a long absence from the business.

I've been studying Epoch vs CCBill, and it appears that CCBill offers the new merchant the option to opt out of using VISA, thus not paying the $750 and annual VISA fees, but Epoch does not offer that option. Am I correct?

Also, without the VISA charge, are there any other initial fees to creating a basic CCBill account?

And what about Verotel's free setup account? Any comments?

I'm just trying to establish a protected, low-key site for lovers of gay mythological fantasy like myself, and probably wouldn't make tons of money anyway, so just MC, online checks and 1-900 would probably be enough, at least for now.

Thanks,

Jaroq

[nicedreams]

I don't think Epoch would force you to accept Visa. However, as everyone will tell you, most sales somewhere around 70% of them are Visa cards. All check cards in the usa are Visa cards.

I'm unaware of any fees for either Epoch or CCBill when starting.

I'm unfamiliar with Verotel.

Oh, and online checks always bounce.

Jimmy

[basschick]

i know people who opted to skip visa over the $750 fee and use only the other cards. of course, they make a lot less sales - i accidentally promoted a site that dropped visa during the time i promoted them and sales halved - literally.

if you're talking about using verotel tickets club - the free version of verotel - most (although not all) webmasters find that they make significantly less sales. one guy i know increased his sales 40% when he switched away from verotel, and he didn't make any changes at all. and you'll be looking at less affiliates since verotel has very poor affiliate stats. also it's impossible to do multiple tours or fhg's with verotel simply or to pay affiliates more than 50%, so you also won't be able to offer incentives.

[Lee]

Is your site going to be 'porn' orientated or will it be filled with images like in your avatar?

If there isnt going to be any graphic nudity you will be able to process using Visa without having to pay the fee.

We have several non-porn sites processing with Visa that we didnt have to pay the $750 for.

Regards,

Lee

[gaybucks_chip]

I am of the impression that Epoch will simply not accept new clients (or, for that matter, existing clients) who do not process Visa. However, as others have said, 60 to 70% of US-based purchases are with Visa rather than Mastercard, though I suspect many surfers probably have both cards.

For a variety of reasons, I really believe CCBill is the way to go if you're after a single processor. Verotel seems to be very solid and reliable, but I've always heard spotty things about support and being able to reach people. Segpay has a history of processing for questionable sites, and all the others out there are either new or smaller.

It won't hurt to dip your toes in the water and do mastercard only... and don't forget euro debit, also offered by CCBill; a very large portion of European customers don't use credit cards for this sort of purchase. But if you start getting any sort of traffic or sales, or expect to get affiliates, you'll need to bite the bullet and get Visa approval.

[basschick]

while it won't hurt you to dip your toes in the water without visa, you may get a skewed impression of how your money/sales will go without it.

btw, lee is quite correct - we have a non-nude and non-explicit site that didn't require the visa fee.

[jaroq]

Thanks to everyone for your advice and perspectives! All of it helps!

Yup, my site will require the Visa fee...my warriors and warlocks get naked and get it on big time...even though they're just artwork. Like I've read somewhere on this site, cartoons are people, too...so now I'm wondering how to age ID my drawings for the 2257 regs and Australia -- none of them have driving licenses or passports!

Chip, I appreciate the supportive "dip my toes in the water" -- that's what I was thinking. If I make over $750 with MC., etc., then I can use that for the Visa fee. Like I said, I'm just starting this website venture to share my fantasy world, while protecting and financially supporting it at the same time. And if it starts to actually make some money, then I can always upgrade the billing, right?

Jar'

[ccjax]

Jumping in late on this -
CCBill does not require VISA to process with us, and we have a lot of clients who add VISA later in the game. And we have no minimum monthly volume requirements.

As Chip mentioned - You can process MasterCard, JCB, Discover, Online Checks (ACH), EU Debit and DirectPayEU (kind of like billpay in Europe) - so you could provide some decent options until you are ready for VISA.

Drop me a line - gary at ccbill.com

[BradBreakfast]

$750 isn't that bad compared to the money you can make with a decent membership site.

[derekt]

A suggestion, this is only a suggestion.
What we did when we first began with membership sites....

We were first with Verotel's tickets club. We received one sign-up per maybe every 2 weeks (not accepting visa).

After being with Verotel's tickets club for 3 short months, we switched over to CCBill. We did not register with Visa at that time. However, conversions came in at a larger scale than the once per 2 weeks.
We are "THINKING" that those did not really like the Tickets Club processing.

Several months later we had a problem with a client support representative with CCBill. (This has been addressed and taken care of by CCBill - I would rather not bring this situation up again).
We went to Epoch.

As I've said before on the board, Epoch primarily wants high volume accounts. We were dropped for this reason. Epoch came to us and gave us two options:
1- Accept Visa and remain with Epoch
2- Leave Epoch

We accepted Visa. 2 weeks later after Visa was activated with us, we were terminated by Epoch due to being a low volume client.
We went back to CCBill, we have been with CCBill a year and a half now with Visa.

I would say a good 95% of our members subscribed using a Visa credit card.

What we planned on doing when we first started was we processed without Visa to bank up the $750 fee.

Now the difference between Epoch and CCBill on the Visa annual renewing is:
EPOCH: My UNDERSTANDING is that you have to pay this annually by credit card.
CCBILL: They will debit out incriments of something like $62.50 per week until the $350 has been paid. They take that out of your account prior to cutting you checks.

We are a big supporter in CCBill. I can honestly personally say that they will do the best that they can at whatever possible to assist their clients in growth.
A year ago with CCBill we were processing 2-5 signups per week.
We are now doing that a day, if not more.

Epoch offered us no materials to grow on nor did they care to assist even when we questioned.

I highly suggest accepting visa. If your serious about reaching a profit with your membersites, accept Visa. That is where a vast majority of your signups will generate from. If you don't accept Visa, you will lose many signups.

[derekt]

Drop me a line - gary at ccbill.com

I highly suggest that you have Gary as a rep if you go with CCBill. He handles our account. He is very good at what he does, he will help you go far! I am not saying this for brownie points, hell I'm the account owner. It would do me no justice either way. But Gary has really provided us the tools necessitate to grow. Gary got us set up with password abuse protection (Ie members sharing passwords), he got us set up with the programming back end of xxxdto.com which is doing extremely well, and we are now starting a downloadable clips store that we own that is starting to generate traffic.

Just my suggestions.

[basschick]

the problem is that not using visa, you won't make many sales. it won't really give you an idea of what to expect, and unless you have plenty of your own traffic, you won't make much $. either way, you'll make probably a max of 30% of what you would have made with visa plus you won't have any quality affiliates since they'll know you don't have visa.

the review sites that list you aren't going to make an issue about it, but most will simply wait till you add visa. that alone will cost you $750 within 2 months of operation without visa.

to me, those things are more than worth a measly $750.

Thanks to everyone for your advice and perspectives! All of it helps!

Yup, my site will require the Visa fee...my warriors and warlocks get naked and get it on big time...even though they're just artwork. Like I've read somewhere on this site, cartoons are people, too...so now I'm wondering how to age ID my drawings for the 2257 regs and Australia -- none of them have driving licenses or passports!

Chip, I appreciate the supportive "dip my toes in the water" -- that's what I was thinking. If I make over $750 with MC., etc., then I can use that for the Visa fee. Like I said, I'm just starting this website venture to share my fantasy world, while protecting and financially supporting it at the same time. And if it starts to actually make some money, then I can always upgrade the billing, right?

Jar'

[Rich]

i was reading on gfy a few days ago that most webmasters wont promote a site if they dont have visa processing because viisa makes up a lot of sales

[basschick]

why would we? like i said, my sales dropped more than 50% on a site i had been promoting that dropped their visa.

and with a site with unusual exclusive content, it would be a shame to miss out on so many sales and affiliate traffic over $750.

i was reading on gfy a few days ago that most webmasters wont promote a site if they dont have visa processing because viisa makes up a lot of sales

[ccjax]

I highly suggest that you have Gary as a rep if you go with CCBill. He handles our account. He is very good at what he does, he will help you go far! I am not saying this for brownie points, hell I'm the account owner. It would do me no justice either way. But Gary has really provided us the tools necessitate to grow. Gary got us set up with password abuse protection (Ie members sharing passwords), he got us set up with the programming back end of xxxdto.com which is doing extremely well, and we are now starting a downloadable clips store that we own that is starting to generate traffic.

No brownie points needed - love you guys!