When it comes to accepting client payments, the question eventually comes up, "Should I accept credit cards." Well, if you're asking me, the answer is yes, maybe, and it depends... In some situations, credit cards are absolutely necessary. In others, you might want to stick with other alternatives.
I've been accepting credit cards for almost as long as I've been shooting weddings. When it comes to selling portrait sessions, prints, albums and such after a shoot, there's really no substitute for accepting plastic. Often times those purchases may be over the phone or the result of an ordering session so checks or cash aren't as useful an option.
If you're just getting started or your "merchant processing" volume is low, you may want to check out Paypal's virtual terminal option. For $30 per month and about 3 percent per transaction, you can run cards through their website. The benefit to this is that you don't have to purchase a terminal that can amount to several hundred and lock you into a long term contract. Once you develop more volume, you can go shopping for a more competitive processing company.
Warning on Weddings
The question that I'm often asked is "Is it okay to accept credit cards for wedding payments." This is where things get tricky. There's a school of thought that says, "Make it easy for your clients to give you money."
The thinking goes that you can do everything online and the client can pay right away. Well, to rephrase an old quote, "The credit card giveth and the credit card company taketh away."
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