Marketing
Worldpay often runs promotional offers to garner new customers, including free hardware in the form of terminals and mobile-device readers. At the time of this review, they also offer a business services perks program, which includes discounts on business resources that can reduce operational expenses.
Although their perks program includes products and services from major brands like GoDaddy, Office Depot, Constant Contact, and HP, we advise against signing up with Worldpay for these perks alone; as a business owner, you’re as likely to find the same, or lower, discounts elsewhere. We find the claim that these perks offer a “significant reduction in operating expenses” to be both disingenuous and purposefully vague.
Honesty
Honesty in marketing is often difficult to review, as it’s an ever-moving target. While Worldpay’s current advertising efforts seem straight-forward in most areas, how they choose to advertise in tomorrow’s market may differ dramatically. We advise our readers to do their own research, talk to sales representatives, and hold the company accountable for all of their claims. Be sure to read the fine print and never leave a single stone unturned. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is; remember, the goal of any service provider is to acquire your business, and they will use as many tactics as necessary (honest or otherwise) to do so. Retention is almost always an easier strategy for a payment processor, so dig in and do your diligence first so you’re not paying the price later, when it’s much more difficult — and potentially detrimental to your bottom line — to change providers.
Sales
Worldpay utilizes both an in-house sales team, as well as external agents, ISOs, and other partners to supplement their sales pipeline. While having a robust sales team is a common tactic in payment processing, it can often lead to miscommunication, and misrepresentation. This is especially the case with Worldpay, who suffers from hundreds of complaints that can be traced back to the sales process.
In our efforts to review Worldpay’s services, we weren’t able to find anything outwardly misleading about their direct sales pitch, but it’s important to note that there are hundreds of other customers who’ve levied valid complaints against their company, and despite maintaining an A+ Rating with the BBB, Worldpay has received poor marks from enough customers that we advise any merchant considering their services to be cautious.
Staff Education
Worldpay’s sales staff sounded competent and well-educated during the pre-sales process. While the accuracy of the information is not immediately obvious, their sales team does an excellent job of building confidence in the customer. Keep in mind, this is not what matters most, however, and it’s fairly obvious from the numerous customer complaints that the sales staff may not be accurately representing the company — and more importantly, its fees — despite being educated on payment processing and its company’s internal policies. The rule of thumb is to trust the fine print, and not the sales staff.
Staff Interaction
Getting in touch with Worldpay can be hit or miss. Many of their product pages include calls-to-action which put you in direct contact with the sales team via email (watch out for the checkboxes on these forms that include signing up for their marketing emails). They also have a live-chat option, and toll-free numbers for their sales and support team are located throughout the site.
Unfortunately, in our experience email responses were slow and took several messages back and forth before we received answers to our pre-sales questions. In many cases, these email threads were cut short by the insistence that we chat with their sales team over the phone.
Live-chat, which offered the most direct and immediate contact with the sales team, was unreliable in its availability and led to a communication loop that quickly became frustrating as the online representative insisted on garnering our business contact information or jumping on a phone call before relinquishing important details like rates, and termination fees. This strategy is common, and ensures the sales team captures your name, email address, and phone number in their CRM before relaying important details about their company; make sure to get the info you need first, before giving up your business info and subjecting yourself to future marketing efforts — which can be aggressive in this industry.
When we asked, plainly, whether or not we could get a simple breakdown of their rates, the sales team member we spoke with adamantly stated that it was too complicated and he must speak with us, even going so far as ending the conversation and leaving us out to dry…
[Rates] are based on a lot of things. Industry is one of the largest factors. My number is [redacted]. If you change your mind and feel the call is worth your time, please give me a call.
Getting in touch with Worldpay via their toll-free number was also frustrating, as we ended up listening to endless ringing after selecting the option to speak to their sales department. We were unable to reach a sales team member, and weren’t given the option to leave a message, leading us to call back several times. A normal customer is likely to give up after the first failed attempt to contact the sales team, and we hope Worldpay improves upon this aspect of their sales process, especially considering how adamantly they insist on getting you on a call when using other methods to get in touch with their team.
Support
Responsiveness
Worldpay’s support team is extremely responsive and adept at handling customer complaints and concerns. Although there are a number of negative reviews circling the web, we’ve discerned that these negative experiences are coming mainly from miscommunications in the sales process, and not from the lack of competency or attentiveness of the support team.
Availability
Here again, we see the support team pulling ahead of the sales staff. Availability was consistent and reliable, with our attempts to reach a support team member baring fruit every time. As with every aspect of this review, these experiences are subject to change and may improve or degrade with time, but at the time of this writing Worldpay’s support staff remains exemplary.
Complaints
Sadly, Worldpay’s complaints are many and varied, receiving negative marks in all of the most important areas of payment processing: hidden fees, early termination/cancellation fees, poorly communicated rates, and misleading contract terms.
While Worldpay responds quickly to public complaints, there are simply too many of them to ignore. Their company currently has over 200 complaints registered with the Better Business Bureau (BBB), and several complaints submitted to Ripoff Report, Yelp, and other online forums.
We took the time to read through every complaint, to save you the trouble. The most common customer issues are related to early termination fees (and the overall cost of these fees), as well as the abrupt termination of accounts and withholding of merchant funds. Again, Worldpay has been very responsive in getting back to their unhappy customers, but responding to a complaint, and fixing the core problem causing it, are two very different monsters.
Pricing
While this area is usually reserved for listing rates and other associated fees for our readers, we were unable to garner this information from Worldpay while posing as regular customers, and thus we cannot share their current (and accurate) rate information with you at this time. As a rule, we want to provide you with as much information as we can so you can make an informed decision as a business owner, and it was frustrating that we weren’t able to paint a clear picture of Worlpay’s rates for you.
Hardware Costs
Like most payment processors, Worldpay often runs promotions that result in diminished or even negligible hardware costs. Although you should keep in mind that this kind of offer is prevalent in the industry — if free hardware isn’t being offered by one provider, it is surely being offered by another — and getting ahold of a Verifone terminal or mobile-device reader is par for the course these days. Things to look out for include fees for not activating your terminal within a specific period of time, processing a certain amount of transactions per location/device, or terminating your account before your contract term has been fulfilled.
Termination Fees
Worldpay insists that they service a number of industries that are not charged an early termination fee. In our experience, we were told we would not receive an early termination fee as a result of the industry-type we were in, but later discovered that other customers in this space were also getting hit with these fees.
It’s imperative, as a customer, that you read through your contract terms closely and ensure there aren’t any caveats you’ll need to watch out for should you decide to cancel your services early. As this is one of the most common complaints leveraged against Worldpay, we would caution you to be very diligent and even consider having a second pair of eyes read through the terms of termination or cancellation to ensure you won’t be surprised down the road.
What We Think
Worldpay’s longevity in the market, and its strong customer support channel is desirable for merchants of all types, yet its lackluster approach to sales and its inability to properly disseminate fees, especially in the mainstream payments space where other providers are willing to give you this information upfront, is troubling.
Worldpay’s excessive complaints history is also problematic; there seems to be an ever-growing number of customer issues, and while Worldpay’s support and public relations team is on the job answering these complaints quickly and effectively, the processes and policies in place that cause them don’t appear to be getting addressed in a timely manner — if at all.
It’s difficult to recommend Worldpay’s services when there are so many other, newer processors on the market that are willing to be upfront about their rates and fees, and whom are just as willing to fix a serious issue in their core business model as they are to respond to customer complaints. While being a player in the industry since the early 90’s is certainly commendable, it’s as if Worldpay simply can’t keep up with the demands of the changing and growing market, with many of its newer, younger competitors not only rising to the challenge, but handedly beating Worldpay at its game.
