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Comment by nolok | Hacker News Reader

Instead of closing your service, may I recommend switching to payplug.com ? Started as a small smartup, now bought by a french main bank chain but has english documentation, very clean API, easy to get support, low fees. Easily handle refunds, payment link, payment page integrated or separate, 3D Secure, subscription/recurring payment, etc etc ...

Been using them for a few companies the past year and a half, and migrated more and more of my stuff over to them, it offers the simplicity and clarity of "stripe at the beginning" while already being backed and owned by a major bank (BPCE, 2nd biggest banking group in France). They don't have all the bells and whistles of current Stripe, but for most projets we don't need that anyway.

And there is no bullshit about random overnight account closure with no recourse.

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> "no bullsh*t about random overnight account closure..."

Is it possible to predict this in advance? Can't these companies just do it any old time they feel like it? There's always a first.

Or is there good regulation in France?

I would say it's mostly the attitude, it's just a very different way to view things and to have a relation with your payment processor ; where there is an issue my experience has been that they talk to you to find a solution together, which may be higher fees or some options and controls becoming mandatory for your account, rather than throwing you away to avoid being stained like Paypal is known for and Stripe is more and more moving toward (again, my opinion).

In terms of regulation though, short of explicit chargeback or disputed charges, they will never hold your money hostage.

Which is why I added that they're already backed and owned by a major bank, so it's not at risk of changing overnight after being acquired. For reference they exist since 2012 and have over 16k merchant account, including some big names in France (Veepee, Lastminute.com, ...) including some big names in business I feel like Stripe wouldn't touch (Dorcel store / adult toys and movies, Winamax and Pokerstar / online betting and poker, ...).

> where there is an issue my experience has been that they talk to you to find a solution together

Processors take note, this is the way. btw, in person-to-person processing deals (which can provide APIs in most cases) this is just how it works.

Note for business owners: Those annoying merchant services calls you get as a business owner, yes, those are the people to speak to. A bit of research into what interchange is, and what those rates are, and you can write your own contracts. It is exceedingly simple and as fine-grained as you'd like to make it (we are nerds, after all). Merchant services partners ultimately want to make money, and if you have an understanding of fee structures, you will find someone local to you who will sign you on favorable terms for both parties, it's free money for them.

Thank you for the suggestion. I'll check it out.

Would it be a good idea to have multiple payment methods ? So that if one goes down this way, the other still exists ?

"Not all eggs in the same basket" ?

This is very relevant to my immediate needs. I just posted a question to Ask HN seeking advice on this topic and hadn’t heard of payplug. Do you have any experience with them as part of a multi-vendor marketplace product?

I don't but I doubt they would have any issue. You will need to deal yourself with the % owned to each and stuff like this, but beside that I don't see any issue arising

Does Payplug solve global VAT or at least EU VAT?

I can't seem to find any mention on their website about this.

No that's one thing they don't do that I do miss, for the value they just take an amount and charge that, how to cut it into product and taxes is yours to deal with.

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