So, what’s the best e-commerce credit card reader for your phone?

It looks like I’m maybe vending at Galactic Con after all, so I need a card reader (unless I was planning to do it all cash, which I am not). I also need a banner and some actual books to sell, but that’s easy enough to arrange. Do I want the Square, the Paypal, or something else?

Moe Lane

10 thoughts on “So, what’s the best e-commerce credit card reader for your phone?”

  1. Most vendors I see in vendor rooms in the past used Square, but that was 2+ years ago now and times change. I’d recommend contacting your bank and seeing what they recommend for their business clients.

  2. As a buyer, I see a lot of Square out there.. which tells me it’s easy enough to use.
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    I like it when I see Square because it means email receipts are an option – one less thing for me to haul around and lose .. and they allow a tip option- sometimes even for places we don’t normally think of leaving tips.
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    Mew

  3. My wife uses Square for her business (and has for a few years now), and I can think of several other small/single owner businesses that use it as well. It’s been able to handle everything she’s needed to do with a brick-and-mortar store as well as occasional events in differing tax jurisdictions without any major hassle.

  4. FWIW, my business is orthogonal to payment acceptance services, so I have some familiarity with it. Also, I use Square for my non profit membership organization; it works just fine for us, but our members are older and only use cash or cards. If the reader or the card is balky for some reason, you can just type the card number into the app on your phone. The up and coming payment platform appears to be Stripe, however.

    I’d look at those two first. Square is a little cheaper per transaction. They have a free mag card reader that plugs into your phone, and a bluetooth device to read chips and NFC for $50. Stripe charges $60 for theirs. Stripe accepts cards, Apple Pay, and Google Pay out of the box. Paypal is about the same price, accepts Paypal obviously, and the card reader is $25. There are setup requirements to accept Paypal through Stripe or Square.

    All that said, if I was going to open a payment account for the purpose of selling at cons, I’d first ask myself how the attendees are going to want to pay. Then, I’d ask myself how much hassle I was willing to accept to accommodate the various methods I think they’re going to want. Personally, I think that you’ll want to accept plastic cards and NFC payments; I don’t think I’d jump through the extra hoops of accepting PayPal in an in-person environment.

    You may also want to know that Jack Dorsey is the CEO of Square.

  5. One pertinent question… how close are you going to be to the nearest ATM (and how long are the lines for that ATM likely to be)? I’m not saying that you can necessarily get an answer to that question, but if you can, it seems like it would be pertinent data.

    1. I have no idea about the venue: I’ve never been before. I am definitely doing it, though: ordered the books and paid for the table and everything.

      Moving along, I’m feel a consensus here: Square, or Stripe. I already have Stripe, but Square may have more options. I will need to ponder further.

      1. If you already have Stripe, and can get (or have) a card / chip reader, it should be adequate for 80%, everyone else can be sent to the ATM.
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        (Offer a 5% discount for cash and they’ll think it’s worth the extra steps…)
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        Mew
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        p.s. For you, Patreon one-time tip jar may be an additional option

        1. Well… that’s going to depend on how far away the ATM is and how bad the lines for it are, innit?

          1. Break it down.
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            If 20% of the trade won’t be able to use Stripe….
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            Figure some of ‘em can use Patreon or Venmo .. some will have been to a con before and will have ready ca$h ..
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            … so it’s the fraction who haven’t cash, card, or Patreon who’ll need to stand in the ATM line … and what kind of ATM card doesn’t work in either Stripe or Venmo again?
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            Mew

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