Worldpay are one of the world’s largest card payment processing companies working with hundreds of thousands of businesses in dozens of countries around the world. As opposed to other newer entrants in the market, they have the history, the reach, the technology, and the infrastructure to provide virtually any type of payment processing service that a business would want.
Their range of products and tariffs is simple but expensive in comparison to their competitors. But are the extra fees and charges you’d be paying worth it? Is it wise to sign yourself up to an 18-month contract with them? Will their software provide you with the performance and sales analysis you need to move your business forward and better understand your customer base?
In this article, we’ll share you with:
- who Worldpay is – they go back a long way,
- which cards Worldpay accept,
- the card payment equipment offered by Worldpay,
- how to accept online, phone, and email payments with Worldpay,
- Worldpay’s tariffs and charges,
- how to get a loan from Worldpay when you’re their customer,
- security compliance and Worldpay,
- recordkeeping and reporting via the Worldpay Dashboard,
- Worldpay’s POS system,
- what customer support you can expect from Worldpay,
- Worldpay’s online reviews, and
- whether you should choose Worldpay as your merchant services account provider.
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Who is Worldpay?
First established in the UK in 1989 as Streamline, the company was in its first incarnation the in-house merchant services account provider at NatWest Bank. In 1997, Worldpay launched separately targeting the multi-currency online payment market during the very early years of the rapid growth of the Internet.
Streamline then acquired Worldpay and, in 2002, Royal Bank of Scotland bought NatWest, at which point Streamline was rebranded as RBS Worldpay.
Worldpay were recently bought out by Fidelity National Information Services
Following the financial crisis of 2009, RBS was forced to sell off WorldPay (although they retained a 20% stake in the business). In 2010, it was acquired by Bain Capital and Advent Capital before being floated on the Stock Exchange. In 2017, Vantiv bought the firm prior to selling it to FIS in March 2019.
Which cards are accepted by Worldpay?
Worldpay accepts Visa, MasterCard, and American Express credit and debit cards. Their equipment offers contactless payment options including Apple Pay and Android Pay.
Worldpay’s equipment
Worldpay offers five different card payment machines to customers as shown below:
Worldpay Reader card payment machine
The Worldpay Reader is a small and portable terminal designed to allow customers to take payments anywhere. You download Worldpay’s POS app onto your smartphone or tablet and then you link that to the Reader machine. As long as you can get a mobile phone signal or connect to a Wi-Fi signal, you can take payment from customers.
Link to Worldpay Reader card payment machine.
Worldpay Ingenico Ict250 Countertop Terminal card payment machine
Supplied to the latest PCI PTS standard, the Ingenico Ict250 Countertop Terminal payment machine is designed for use at a fixed point in cafes, convenience stores, and retail stores.
Link to Worldpay Ingenico Ict250 Countertop Terminal card payment machine.
Worldpay Ingenico iWL250 – Connect card payment machine with WiFi
Again supplied to current PCI PTS standards, the iWL250 can be moved around your premises to where your customers are sitting – ideal for hospitality businesses like restaurants, bars, and pubs.
The machine accepts gratuities for waiting staff and you can connect more than one iWL250 to the same WiFi network (or mobile phone tether) for restaurants, cafes, and pubs operating from larger premises.
Link to Worldpay Ingenico iWL250 – Connect card payment machine with WiFi.
Worldpay Ingenico Iwl252 – Connect card payment machine with Bluetooth
The Iwl252 is an adapted version of the iWL250 which connects via Bluetooth instead of Wi-Fi. The unit can be plugged into a router and run off a standard phone line.
Link to Worldpay Ingenico Iwl252 – Connect card payment machine with Bluetooth.
Worldpay Move 5000 mobile card payment machine
The Move 5000 can connect to the O2, Vodafone, or EE networks by SIM as well as to Bluetooth and to WiFi. It has the ability to handle refunds, cashback requests, and gratuities as well as standard cash transactions.
Link to Worldpay Move 5000 mobile card payment machine.
Accepting online, phone, and email payments with Worldpay
WorldPay allows you to accept payments online, over the phone, and via email link using its Virtual Terminal service.
The Virtual Terminal service is not a stand-alone offering – it may only be taken out by customers on the Custom, Fixed Monthly, or Simplicity tariffs for an additional £9.95 a month. Virtual Terminal is not available to its Pay As You Go tariff clients.
To be able to take payments via the Virtual Terminal, you need access to the internet. To use it, you log onto Worldpay’s web-based interface and enter the cardholder’s details onto the screen to process payments. No technical set up is required and the user interface is intuitive, even for customers with little or no PC experience or confidence.
For companies wishing to accept credit and debit cards online, there are two payment gateway choices – a “hosted pay page” which can be set up to take payments almost straight away and an “integration payment page” for customers who want to take payments from their own website.
With the hosted pay page, they are taken to a special page hosted by Worldpay when the customer is ready to pay – your website talks to the hosted pay page via a short snippet of code you insert onto your website. If you host the payment page instead with the “integration” option, you can control both the page design and the user experience.
With either option, you can accept all major credit cards and debit cards as well as PayPal payments. For security compliance, Worldpay is responsible if you choose a hosted web page and you’re responsible if you select the integration payment page option.
You can also request payment by invoice sent by email. The invoice you send has an embedded link which your client clicks to take them to a secure, dedicated payment page. This is Worldpay’s Pay By Link service.
Worldpay’s tariffs
Worldpay’s tariffs are a mixture of face to face tariffs and ecommerce tariffs in addition to a simple pay as you go tariff.
With the exception of the recently relaunched Worldpay Pay As You Go tariffs, the company does not tend to advertise its standard transaction rates on its website, preferring to do bespoke deals with each customer based upon its own internal tariffs and responses to competitor quotes you have received.
You should expect to be offered lower tariffs once your card transaction volume surpasses £300,000 a year.
For contracts with a minimum term, you should expect to pay an early termination fee. Virtual Terminal and Pay by Link transactions may also attract a premium transaction fee.
Worldpay Pay As You Go tariff
The Worldpay Pay As You Go tariff has no monthly subscription or joining fee – you make a one-off payment for a terminal (normally £150) and a set-up fee of £25. There is a single payment transaction rate for clients (except for premium transactions) and no minimum commitment period.
A new pricing matrix has recently been announced for the Pay As You Go tariff – you can either pay 2.75% of transaction value plus 20p or pay £19.95 a month for a 2.75% credit card rate and a 0.75% debit card rate.
Worldpay Custom tariff
Worldpay offers the Custom tariff to clients who run established businesses whose owners have a strong understanding of the types of transactions they take and who want to build a plan around that.
The face to face tariff is £15 a month with a terminal rental fee of £17.45 in addition. Clients pay differing rates for credit and debit card transactions as well as transaction authorisation fees. You pay an additional £29.99 for PCI annual management, the Virtual Terminal costs an additional £9.95 a month as does the Pay by Link service.
The ecommerce version of the tariff is £19.95 a month and includes 350 online gateway transactions, the Pay by Link service, and the Virtual Terminal facility. As with the face to face tariff, there is a separate PCI annual management fee and debit & credit card transaction fees.
Worldpay Fixed Monthly tariffs
The Worldpay Fixed Monthly ecommerce tariff is fixed at £49.99 and includes all transaction and authorisation fees (subject to a threshold turnover limit). It includes the Pay by Link service, a PCI annual management fee, and the Virtual Terminal among other benefits.
The Worldpay Fixed Monthly face to face tariff is fixed at £49.99 and also includes all transaction and authorisation fees (subject to a threshold turnover limit). Customers are offered a choice of mobile , portable, or desktop terminals and the price includes the PCI annual management fee. If you want the Virtual Terminal, you’ll pay an extra £9.95 a month, the Pay by Link service £9.95 a month, and an online payments gateway £19.95 a month.
Worldpay Simplicity tariff
The Worldpay Simplicity face to face tariff costs £17.50 a month and includes authorisation fees, the PCI annual management fee, and a choice of portable, mobile, or desktop terminal. As with the Fixed Monthly tariff, if you want the Virtual Terminal, you’ll pay an extra £9.95 a month, the Pay by Link service £9.95 a month, and an online payments gateway £19.95 a month.
The Worldpay Simplicity ecommerce tariff costs £19.95 a month and you’re provided with the Pay by Link service, the Virtual Terminal Service, and an online payments gateway fee. There is an online gateway fee of 10p per transaction.
Worldpay Business Dashboard tariff
Both versions of the Fixed Monthly, Custom, and Simplicity tariffs are subject to an 18 month minimum contract and include the My Business Dashboard free of charge for the first three months (£4.95 a month thereafter).
Worldpay business cash advances
In common with many other merchant services providers, Worldpay offer a merchant cash advance service allowing customers to borrow against expected future debit and credit card revenue. The amount you can actually borrow is based upon an average of your recent historic daily card transaction levels.
Once a day, Worldpay will pay the transactions you’ve taken into your current account. Worldpay’s settlement period – the length of time between taking a payment and the day your business actually receive the money – is generally one to three days. All card payments taken on one day are rolled up into one big payment.
If you take out a merchant cash advance, the daily settlement you receive is deducted by between 3% and 10% of the total amount – this is used to reduce the balance on your business cash advance. These payments will continue until the balance reaches zero.
How much does a merchant cash advance cost? It depends on the amount of money you borrow, your company credit score, and how you managed your Worldpay account but the cost is generally between 10% and 40% of the cash advanced to you.
When you apply, you will receive a quote within 5 minutes (subject to status) and, if approved and agreed, the money will appear in your business current account within 48 hours.
Worldpay security compliance
Worldpay offers customers two options for PCI DSS compliance – “SaferPayments” and “SaferPayments Plus”. PCI DSS not only protects sensitive customer financial data but it also protects you from non-compliance fines, the risk of cybersecurity attacks, and it provides customers with confidence that you take their security seriously.
With the SaferPayments program, Worldpay claims that you can achieve compliance in as little as 30 minutes via their web-based portal. On the portal, 90% of the information required to achieve compliance is prepopulated on your PCI DSS application form. Telephone, email, and chatbot support is available 6 days a week and you can schedule a quarterly automatic security check for ongoing compliance.
SaferPayments Plus is a phone-based support service taking customers step by step through the compliant process backed up by the provision of security tools, a web application firewall, anti-virus protection, website defence, compliance renewal notifications, and much more.
Worldpay reporting
In common with many other merchant services account providers, Worldpay offers a sophisticated app- and web-based platform allowing you to better manage your account with the company – the Worldpay Dashboard.
The Dashboard allows you to better understand your business’s sales performance on a monthly, weekly, or daily basis so you can better see and react to customer trends and preferences. When logging in, you’ll also see a schedule of settlements due to land in your account so that you can manage your cash flow better.
The Dashboard allows you to download and view Worldpay invoices and you have instant access to your entire transaction history. You can select from a number of pre-built reports on historical card transactions and customer spending patterns.
Worldpay POS
The WorldPay Hub is a POS system whose hardware includes a tablet, a keypad, a printer, a cash drawer, and an optional barcode scanner.
The WorldPay Hub can be integrated with EPOS systems (with some programmer intervention) but there seems to be a high degree of compatibility between the Hub and Epos Now’s off-the-shelf packages.
Worldpay customer support
Worldpay operate 24/7 customer services teams for card machine support, online and virtual terminal support, and larger businesses.
Worldpay’s reviews
Worldpay’s online reviews are a mixed bag. On Trustpilot, they score 3.5 out of 5 from a total of 2,066 reviews. Half of the reviews given for the company award them just one star and, out of the 25th card processing companies monitored on Trustpilot, they finish in second last place. They also finish in second last place for payment service.
Should you choose Worldpay?
WorldPay are among the most expensive merchant services providers on the market – there are definitely cheaper options available for customers to choose from. However, given the company’s size, its investment in its infrastructure, and its experience across a variety of different sectors, you should find working with them a positive experience.
It tends to tie its merchants to an 18 month minimum contract so if you are new to processing credit and debit cards and you’re unsure of the volume and size of payments you might take, it may be worth selecting a competitor offering no minimum contract term first before you commit to any longer contract with a company like Worldpay.
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