This is the latest example of the just missed it form of luck I seem to be having lately.
You see, over the last week I have decided (with some discussion with my partner in cyber-crime) to dissolve our hosting business and pursue work that actually makes us money.
One of the biggest gripes I got was that we used Paypal as out payment means primarily. While this shouldnt be a big deal (in our opinion) it is for a lot of others. So, after we decide to nix the whole thing I find First Data merchant services.
Usually I have a hard time dealing with merchant services because there is so much room for some swindling of the customer (me) and usually not a lot of depth to the company itself or its services.
After cruising around their site I look, first, to what they offer. They have the usually suspects as far as services go and a good selection of machines if you have a brick & mortar.
What I notices mostly was all the free services they offer. This has generally been a dodgy thing in the past but I found that it made some sense to offer these services as they are already making money from the fees and such.
The free programming help they offer was of particular interest to me as I am still a little skittish when it comes to e-commerce/security type development. But theyre offers of help are most encouraging.
I have to say, though, that I am a bit disappointed that they do not list their rates right off on the site, but this is usually not done from my experience as they usually cut deals to larger clients or those that they see no trouble from (hey, I cant blame them as I did the same thing).
But other than this one area, the rest of it looks pretty decent and they look to be trustworthy. I am going to keep them in mind when I start up the hosting thing again (what? You think I would really just forget about it?) but for now you can check them out if you are in need of such services.
-Cheers