Credit Card Processing Consultant

A credit card processing consultant promises to cut what you pay to accept cards. Almost every one of them can point to a client who saved money. One question decides whether you actually come out ahead, and hardly anyone asks it out loud. Who writes the consultant’s paycheck?

There are only three answers. The processor pays them, you pay them a share of what they find, or you pay them a flat fee. Each answer produces a different set of incentives, and those incentives shape the advice you get long before anyone opens your statement. Kevin Harrington, an original Shark from Shark Tank, put his name behind the third model. Below is the video and the full transcript. Below that is the part he did not have time to explain in seventy seven seconds: why the pay structure is the whole ballgame.

What a credit card processing consultant actually does

Card acceptance costs are built in three layers. Interchange goes to the bank that issued your client’s card and typically accounts for 80 to 90 percent of what you pay. Assessments go to Visa, Mastercard, Discover and Amex. The third layer, the processor’s markup, is the only one anybody negotiates, and it is the layer nobody publishes.

That opacity exists on purpose. Credit card processing is a non-regulated industry. No agency reviews the fees, no agency validates them, and every processor lets its salespeople write whatever deal they can get. That is precisely why none of them publishes pricing. Take two merchants on the same processor, doing the same volume in the same industry. They routinely pay wildly different rates. Their statements disclose wildly different amounts of detail. A credit card processing consultant exists because that gap is real, and because merchants have no practical way to see into it.

The good ones do more than compare rates. They read the statement line by line. Every transaction gets checked against the interchange category it qualifies for. The merchant category code and the gateway configuration get inspected too. Then they separate the fees the networks actually charge from the ones the processor invented and gave an official sounding name. Finally, they either fix the deal you have or help you replace it.

The three ways a credit card processing consultant gets paid

Before you judge a credit card processing consultant on skill, look at how they get paid. Skill without aligned incentives just makes someone better at serving a different party’s interests.

Model one: the processor pays them

This is the most common setup and the least visible one. Comparison sites, marketplaces, review directories and many independent brokers earn a referral fee, a residual, or a share of your processing revenue. The service can be free to you. That is because the processor is buying the introduction, not because the work has no cost.

Consider what that does to the advice. A residual pays out on the markup. So the deal that earns the most is rarely the one that costs you the least. More to the point, the cheapest outcome is usually to stay where you are and fix the deal you already have. A consultant funded this way has no reason to tell you that. A merchant services broker in this model earns nothing when you stay put.

Model two: they take a percentage of your savings

Sold as no savings, no cost, this looks like the merchant friendly choice. Sometimes it is. But three things travel with it that deserve daylight.

First, contingency pricing is bought with a lock-in. Somebody has to protect the upside, so these agreements run for years. The longer the term, the more of your savings end up back in someone else’s pocket. Second, the payment consultant now shares your gains. A portion of every dollar recovered stops being yours. Third, and least obvious, a percentage model rewards the size of the number rather than how long the fix lasts. A big one time win pays better than a quiet fix that simply holds for ten years.

Model three: you pay a flat fee

In the third model the merchant is the only party paying. So the merchant is the only party the credit card processing consultant serves. A flat fee credit card processing consultant earns the same whether you stay with your processor, redo the deal, or leave. Nothing about the advice changes the invoice.

This is the model weAudit.com runs on. As a credit card processing consultant, we keep none of the savings we find. It is also why we take nothing from any processor in any scenario. weAudit is partly owned by an attorney, and we apply the principle attorneys live by: you do not represent two parties whose agendas conflict.

Why Kevin Harrington put his name on this

Kevin Harrington is an original Shark from Shark Tank, the creator of the infomercial, and a pioneer of the As Seen on TV industry. His ventures have launched more than a thousand products and generated well over six billion dollars in global sales. He meets a great many companies. Here is what he said about this one.

Full transcript of the video

“I’m Kevin Harrington. I’m an original Shark from the hit show Shark Tank. I’m also the creator of the infomercial, pioneer of the As Seen on TV industry and brand, and many of my business ventures have launched, over the years, many products. Over a thousand products, and generated well over six billion dollars in global sales.

But I’m sharing this with you so you understand that I’ve done a lot and seen a lot, and there’s nothing quite like what I’m going to talk to you about. I have not seen it.

And this is because when I first heard about weAudit.com and what they do, I almost didn’t believe it. But when I met Robert Day, the Managing Partner, and heard more about it, my immediate thought was, this is a company that every company needs.

We deal with so many entrepreneurs, and this is going to be a problem solver for many of them, because some of the largest companies in the world use weAudit and they save over ten million dollars a year. So they help businesses of all sizes. In fact, you’re going to like this: even their smallest client is actually a dry cleaner.

So weAudit is in business to help businesses. You know the term “no brainer” that gets tossed around quite a bit in business? This truly is one of those. So when you see what they do, how little they charge, how much they save companies, and with zero risk, well, you’ll agree it’s a no brainer.

So take my advice. Take advantage of their free audit to see if your credit card processor is over billing you, and let weAudit.com get that fixed.”

Seven questions to ask any credit card processing consultant

Ask these before you hand any credit card processing consultant a statement. The answers sort the field faster than any credential does.

1. Do you receive any compensation, in any form, from any processor, ISO, gateway or bank? Ask for a yes or a no, not a speech about values.
2. If I stay with my current processor and you simply fix the pricing, what do you earn? If the answer is nothing, you have learned what the recommendation will be.
3. How long is the agreement? A percentage model almost always needs a multi-year term to work.
4. Do you audit interchange qualification, or only compare markups? Interchange is 80 to 90 percent of the cost. A markup-only review leaves the biggest number untouched.
5. What happens to fees I was already overbilled for in the past? Most firms look forward only.
6. Who reviews my merchant agreement, and can they strike the early termination and equipment fees? That is legal work, not sales work.
7. Is this a one time review or an ongoing audit? Rates and rules change every April and October, and over two hundred rules and rates move in those two releases.

Payments consultant, broker, or auditor: what is the difference?

The titles get used as if they all mean the same thing, which suits the market fine. So it helps to sort a credit card processing consultant by what the work puts out.

A credit card processing broker places your account. The output is a new processor and, usually, a residual for the broker. A payments consultant or payment processing consultant usually advises on strategy: which platform to use, how to set up acceptance, sometimes how to sell in new channels. The output is advice. A merchant services consultant sits somewhere between the two depending on who is paying.

An auditor puts out something else: a line by line finding on the account you already have, with the errors named and fixed. The difference matters. Roughly nine out of ten merchants do not need a new processor. They need the one they have to be priced and configured correctly. A credit card processing consultant who only places accounts has exactly one tool. So every problem starts to look like a reason to switch.

Before you accept any switching advice, ask a prior question: is this a fight that should ever have taken place? Sometimes the answer really is a new processor. Often it is staying put and fixing the deal. Disrupting payment acceptance is one of the more painful things a growing business can do to itself. Make it a decision, not a default.

What the work involves when it is done properly

weAudit has worked as a credit card processing consultant and auditor since 2009. The audit runs ten points deep. It covers fees, interchange qualification, merchant category codes, gateway setup and contract terms. Interchange optimization alone turns up savings on roughly 99 percent of the audits we run. Categories shift constantly, and nobody at the processor watches your account for downgrades on your behalf.

From there the work splits into fixing the deal, recovering what was already taken, and cleaning up the paperwork. Our attorney network pursues past overbilling and strips early termination, equipment and data fees out of merchant agreements. Then the audit repeats every month, because an account that is right today drifts as rates change, locations get added, and fees quietly reappear. A quiet month is the product.

Want to see the mechanics before you talk to any credit card processing consultant? Four pages do the explaining. Credit card processing fees explained covers the three layers. The statement decoder translates individual line items. The credit card processing audit page walks through the ten points. Pricing sits on what a processing audit costs.

Frequently asked questions

What does a credit card processing consultant do?

A credit card processing consultant reviews what a business pays to accept cards and works to reduce it. The strongest ones read statements line by line. They verify that transactions clear at the interchange categories they qualify for. The merchant category code and the gateway setup get checked as well. Genuine network fees also get separated from fees the processor created. Weaker ones simply compare markups between processors and recommend a switch.

How much does a credit card processing consultant cost?

It depends entirely on the model. A processor funded broker appears free because the processor pays. A contingency firm typically takes 25 to 50 percent of the savings it finds, usually under a multi-year agreement. weAudit charges a low flat monthly fee based on processing volume and account complexity, never a percentage. The fee is published for merchants processing $5MM or less and quoted above that, because larger accounts carry real complexity and often many locations.

Are credit card processing consultants worth it?

The honest answer is that it depends on who pays them. Where the merchant is the only paying party, the arithmetic usually works. Interchange optimization finds something on nearly every account, and the fee is small against what an unexamined account leaks over years. Where the processor pays, you are receiving sales advice with a consulting label on it.

How do I know if a consultant is paid by a processor?

Ask directly and ask for it in writing. Two tells are reliable. First, the service is free to you but the firm is clearly well funded. The money comes from somewhere. Second, every recommendation ends in a switch. A payments consultant with no processor money can afford to conclude that your current processor is fine and only the pricing is wrong.

Can a consultant recover fees I already paid?

Most cannot, because recovery is legal work rather than sales work. weAudit pursues past overbilling through a nationwide attorney network, which is a different exercise from lowering what you pay going forward. Outcomes depend on the facts of the account and on what the processor admits, so no firm can honestly promise a number up front.

What is Kevin Harrington’s connection to weAudit?

Kevin Harrington is an original Shark from Shark Tank and a longtime Florida entrepreneur. He met Managing Partner Robert Day, learned what the firm does, and endorsed it personally. The endorsement is his own and does not come from ABC, Sony Pictures Television, or the Shark Tank program.

Do I have to switch processors?

No. weAudit tries first to fix the processor you already have, and will renegotiate with or help you move to any processor you choose. Because we receive nothing from any processor in any scenario, the flat fee is identical whether you stay, renegotiate, or leave. That is the point of the structure.

What if the audit finds nothing?

Then you spent a few minutes finding out, at no cost. The first audit is free and carries no obligation. If you do engage us and are not happy inside 60 days, you get every penny back and we release you. There is no contract and the relationship is month to month, which means we have to earn it every month.