What are the Total Costs of Credit Card Processing?  

Have you really analysed Credit card processing costs as a vendor or do you just look at the rates charged. I think you need to look way deeper than just rates. Did you know that most vendors charge for equipment or give it away for "Free" and then hook you into a long term contract. Do you know that there are monthly statement fees, annual subscription fees, even cancellation fees if you cancel before the end of your contract.
What about programming fees to set up your system or set up fees, then there is the application fee .What about a cost for setting up for each of the vendors like Visa,American Express or Mastercard.Then there is also the shopping cart fee and a monthly processing gateway fee.
Although credit card processing does increase sales by at least 40%, be careful and investigate your provider more fully. Rates are not the be all and end all.Check out all the costs and ask you vendor to provide a list and then do a comparison of your own