A IP Credit Card Machine simply means your card processing hardware connects via your high speed internet. Sometimes referred as Broadband POS Terminals. These types of credit card machines are quickly becoming the new dominate front runner for mostly widely used (POS) Point of sale Terminals.
The reason why so many merchants are drawn to this machine is because they can process transactions as quickly as 3-5 seconds. When you have a line up at your cash station, time is money and let's face it, customers hate waiting in line and if your business can make that experience less painful then its worth it's wait in gold.
The second benefit to this piece of hardware is you can run multiple credit card machines off all one internet connection, as opposed to the old dial-up units you had to get a separate dedicated phone line for each POS machine. For business with multiple check out stations this one feature could save them hundreds of dollars (if not thousands of dollars) every year in phone expenses.
You can rent, lease and/or buy these credit card processing machines from either your bank or a private label company in Canada. A typically rent cost would be around $30-40/month. You can get lease to own arrangements on 48 month terms for around the same price as rent. Ownership can be anywhere from $900-1500 depending on the hardware and warranties. You may want to serious consider making sure you have a lifetime warranty included on your hardware.
Spending the additional $10-15 a month for a IP credit card machine sometimes pays for itself 10 fold. When shopping around for credit card machines you may want to serious consider the real benefits of using a POS machine that connects via your broadband.
Just a couple of key questions you may want to ask before investing in a IP credit card machine. Make sure the hardware is Chip card ready and EMV certified as this is the new standard that is coming to Canada in the near future. If not, you may not want to lease or buy that machine. Renting would be fine because you can easily upgrade at anytime.
