Marketing
Its website offers clear, fairly thorough information, including a lengthy frequently asked question section. Also, it was nice to see merchant account provider not going overboard with gimmicks and slick promotions. However, the website is dated, slow, and overall unappealing. It has a news section that hasn’t had any updated information since 2007.
In addition to www.pay-world.co.uk, the domain name adult-merchant-account.com also takes a visitor to the PayWorld site. The only main difference in the content is the pricing. It is slightly higher than other merchant accounts. It in no way announces itself as an adult merchant account provider over a high-risk merchant provider. However, the site makes it appear like that is its specialty.
Although the site’s marketing message is honest and frank, it is clear that they are making little effort to promote themselves. When PayWorld is mention any forums, most responses are that they had never heard of the business.
Also, PayWorld hasn’t made any efforts to take advantage of the social platform. It has a LinkedIn page that hasn’t been updated in a few years and it doesn’t appear to use any other social media sites or channels to market their products and services.
Honesty
With all things being equal, PayWorld’s marketing approach may appear genuine on the surface and we didn’t notice anything deceptive or misleading, but we did find it unusual that the site lacked testimonials and not a single review could be found about the business. On one hand, this could mean the staff is doing a great job. But, nobody is usually that perfect. Consumers make more purchasing decisions based on referrals and the reviews they read online than anything related to marketing. So again, we didn’t find anything that looked false, but having others speak about them would have boosted PayWorld’s credibility.
Sales
PayWorld has in-house sales staff and affiliate partners. However, unlike many other payment providers, PayWorld does not engage in a referral program. This type of program can help companies increase revenues but the these tactics can be misleading. When a company allows another to sell its services with the respective company’s internal branding, the result can be many customer service issues.
There are no complaints that PayWorld operates using a disingenuous pitches.
Support
We believe the ability to speak with conviction is a trait that is necessary for salespeople to succeed and be trusted by its clientele. We had little faith that representatives knew any more than the basics or cared whether we were helped or not. After be bounced from department to the next, we had few answers. The most knowledgeable think we were told was to try visiting its FAQs page. The lack of customer service left us baffled and frustrated.
Staff Interaction
Customer service was awful. I was patched too several different departments and was given vague information and also encouraged to view its FAQs on its site. Though the site is helpful, we didn’t like to be rushed off the phone. Trying to reach a representative via email was equally as bad.
Representatives were not only unenthused but rude. Calls were not even answered with a proper customer service greeting. From the way the phone was answered, it wasn’t clear we had reached a business until we asked. We called several times and had similar experiences.
Responsiveness
Customer service is an area where we believe PayWorld fails the most.
IPayWorld offers live chat support but not 24 hours per day. You are prompted to leave a message when live chat is unavailable, but none of the messages sent via this system or email were ever returned. We did not even received an automated response. We find this unacceptable and we are certain that customers must feel the same.
Calling was even worse. The staff was not polite or interested.
Availability
PayWorld offers live chat support, but, it is only available during business hours. The company also makes itself available via email and fax. It also does not use any social media platforms to communicate.
Obviously, we believe the limits on availability definitely negatively impacts customer service.
Pricing
PayWorld offers a fair amount of information in terms of rates and fees. The good news is that PayWorld does not charge an application, weekly, or gateway fee. When it comes to pricing, PayWorld is pretty up front. Each transaction costs $0.10 each and the minimum ticket amount is $1. The U.S. and international discount rates starts at $1.80. This starting fee should be considered the rate for low-risk businesses. Also, there is a statement fee of $20.
PayWorld boasts about being a company that charges no hidden costs. However, that statement is not completely true. It makes clear on the site that the rates and fees provided vary depending on the type of business account and each individual business’ history. For example, the U.S. and international discount rates start at 3.8% for adult business merchant accounts.
Since adult merchants are considered high risk, we can think it fair to assume that other riskier businesses, like tobacco, telecommunications, and betting merchants also can expect rates that start at 3.8%.
There is no application fee, but once approved, customers are charged a set-up fee. This information is not disclosed on the site and representatives will not provide the set-up fee charge until an applicant completes the process. Since it is so transparent with other areas of the business, it is disappointing that this information isn’t offered. This indicates to us that you can probably expect an exorbitant fee.
Hardware Costs
Since merchants are set up with a virtual terminal or an application program interface (API) that can be integrated directly into your existing shopping cart, PayWorld states they will not need any additional hardware or resources. Once the terminal or API is in place, payments will be authorized and processed in real time.
Termination Fees
PayWorld does not charge any early termination fees or impose any minimum or maximum turnover costs. PayWorld claims it does not require clients to commit to “long-term” contracts. However, it is not clear and the representative could not provide any clarity on the specific length of the contract.
Also, it does further claim that after the initial set-up fee, merchants are not charged any recurring or membership fees.
Unique Features
In addition to promising virtual terminal set-ups within hours, PayWorld offers detailed transaction statements, a PCI-compliant payment gateway, website integration support, and fraud protection tools.
PayWorld also works with high-risk online businesses, including adult content, betting, and travel merchants. Multiple forms of currency are supported and cleared funds are transferred to your accounts on a weekly basis.
Complaints
Being in business for more than 10 years, you would think PayWorld would have at least a handful of complaints lodged against them. There are no negative reviews about PayWorld or its parent company, Frontline. Also, there are no negative complaints filed with any consumer agencies. We find this strange to say the least.
