The Wirecard case and how you minimize such risks.
The reports in the media have been overwhelming. The Wirecard case reads almost like a scary financial crime novel. Within a few days, the former high-flyer turns into an insolvency case. There is talk of balance sheet fraud in the billions.
Implications for Swiss e-commerce.
Even if the case comes as a surprise, the insolvency of Wirecard does not have any serious impact on Swiss online shops. The majority of the large webshops in Switzerland already use a combination of Datatrans, as technical payment service provider (PSP), and in the background one of our more than 20 connected credit card acquirers. However, the concept of operating as an "independent" payment service provider has not yet become so well established in the neighbouring countries.
What does "independent" payment service provider mean?
The concept separates technical and financial services from each other, thus enabling flexibility, security and lower costs.
You know the fee structure in online payment. As an online merchant, you are charged pay twice for each purchase: A fixed cent amount per transaction for the technical processing of the payment, and a percentage of the shopping basket (disagio) for the financial service.
If you obtain the technical processing and the financial service from the same provider, a dependency arises that can become very expensive. This means that the merchant can not change the credit card acquirer quickly and easily without having to modify the technical integration. This puts him in a weaker negotiating position when it comes to fees and also involves major risks - high fees and payment shortfall losses are the result.
Our advice: "Don't put all your eggs into one basket".
Many European merchants put everything on one card when it comes to payment. Our advice is not to become too dependent on a single payment service provider.
Our conccept of being an independent payment service provider plays a crucial role here, as merchants can react quickly to changes without major technical adjustments and can easily replace acquirers. This is similar to investments: instead of betting on one stock, you diversify your portfolio and thus reduce your risk.
As an independent payment service provider, we work with more than 20 financial partners, so-called credit card acquirers, so that our customers have a free choice of financial partners. Datatrans' model of being an independent payment service provider has proven its worth for our merchants and will become even more important for many other merchants due to recent incidents.
If you want to know how to remain flexible and independent in order to minimize risks and optimize costs, please contact us. We will be happy to help you out of your dependency.
Our team of payment experts will be happy to advise you.
Call us: +41 44 256 81 91 or email us: sales@datatrans.ch