There are a number of things you need to consider when you’re thinking of setting up a bitcoin merchant account. The questions below will allow you to decide which bitcoin merchant service to use.

Where are you processing the payments? Online or retail? If you are processing payments at a retail store, do you already have a POS? Earn bitcoin or earn fiat? Where is your bank account based?

These questions are critical in deciding which payment processor to use.

1. Where are you processing payments? Online or retail?

Some bitcoin payment processors only do point-of-sales software and/or hardware for bitcoin. Some only do online payments e.g. Gocoin. If you’re processing payments online, most of the processors listed in the previous post can do it.

2. Processing payments at your retail store? Do you already own a Point-Of-Sales system?

If you have a Point of Sales system setup, you should consider adding an extension by downloading a bitcoin payment gateway onto an external device. Many people have a misconception that to accept bitcoin you have to change your Point-of-sales system, which is not true. Bitcoin payments can be just a payment gateway, just like how you accept Visa and Mastercard. So instead of needing to buy a payment gateway device, you can download an app via App Store or Google Play. e.g. CoinPip, Coinbase and Blockchain.info has a Point-of-sales App that can be downloaded from Google Play. If you’re considering a full-featured Point-of-sales system, Mezzofy provides that. They allow merchants to accept Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Alipay and Bitcoin.

3. Earn bitcoin or earn fiat?

Some, such as CoinPip, bitpay and coinbase, convert your bitcoins to fiat at the point of transaction. Whereas some only help you calculate how much bitcoins is required for a particular transaction e.g. blockchain.info.

4. Where is your bank account based?

This is the most important question of all. Companies like coinbase can only serve customers with US bank accounts. Whereas companies like bitpay and CoinPip can serve international clients.



