5 Great Benefits of Accepting Card Payments for Your Small Business

Rewind a decade or two and the suggestion of cashless transactions for small businesses would be almost unthinkable. If you hadn’t already noticed, cash is fast becoming the new cheque – in that people simply never carry it with them anymore.

But with the constant technological advancements of the 21^st century comes higher customer expectations and there is no denying that customers now expect to pay for products and services with their trusty bit of plastic.

If you are still not sold on the idea of accepting card payments within your small business, the 5 reasons listed below will certainly make you think twice.

1. Say Goodbye to Constant Trips to The Bank

We know that this is reason enough for most business owners to immediately investigate accepting card payments if they don’t already. The mundane task of getting down to the bank to pay-in takings is certainly something that no one could miss and by allowing your customers to pay with their card, you will be able to reduce the trips by a considerable amount.

Not only will you be saving time (which for a business owner is absolutely priceless), you will be also be saving yourself money too. Fewer trips to the bank will mean less money spent on fuel but it also frees up more time for you to spend on your business. You won’t need to shut early to shoot over to the bank before it closes which means you can make a few extra sales every week – and as you already know, those extra few all start to add up!

2. Payment Is Effortless

There is nothing more frustrating as a business owner – or customer when a sale that is about to go ahead falls short because the buyer does not have enough cash on them. If your business relies solely on foot traffic to make its money, not accepting card payments will likely hold you back and worse… lose you sales.

Most customers, when not having the right amount of money on their person, will fail to come back regardless of whether they say they plan to. Having to leave an establishment to locate a cash point nearby is often too much hassle for the majority of customers and the moment they walk out the doors of your business is the moment that you probably lose a sale.

Remove the risk of this happening by offering easy, immediate payments for any product or service your business provides.

3. Access One of The Most Sought-After Business Funding Products…

At Nucleus Commercial Finance, we understand that traditional business loans are not everyone’s cup of tea. Secured loans can be daunting for business owners that don’t want to use their property or assets as leverage and a standard business loan with fixed monthly repayments does not suit every small business, especially those that are presented with challenges caused by seasonality.

With a Business Cash Advance (BCA), your payments are entirely flexible, and you borrow money based on your future card earnings. Unlike a business loan where you are tied into an exact term, interest rate and fixed monthly repayment, a BCA allows you to pay a percentage of what you earn each day.

We agree a repayment split and once you get the funding into your account, you begin to pay a percentage of your daily card transactions back to us. This means that you are never paying back more than you are making and when agreeing a repayment term, we take seasonality into consideration so you can comfortably pay back the loan at a pace that suits you.

4. Speed Up Payments to Reduce Those Ghastly Queues

Is there anything worse than standing in horrendously long queues when you just want to pay up and get home? It can be hard keeping long queues at bay and maintaining adequate staffing levels is only half of the solution.

By accepting card payments in your small business, you are enabling transactions to happen at a much faster pace. Customers will not have to wait to see the amount, dig deep into their wallets and count out change to an exact amount. Instead, they can easily present their card or even a mobile device and within the blink of an eye, the payment has been authorised.

Forgetting wallets or even cards are problems of the past as your business can now take payments via mobile phones – and you can guarantee that most people won’t leave their house without it. In fact, Statista estimates that around 94% of adults in the UK own a mobile phone and almost every smartphone available to buy today is a payment-enabled device. For help on which card machines are best for small businesses in the UK, check out this article by Worldpay, the UK’s leading payment processing company.

5. Save Money and Protect Yourself from the Risk of Pilferage

We mentioned previously that you’ll be saving money and fuel by a reduced number of visits to the bank, but the savings don’t end there. Compared to cash and cheques, cards are the cheapest payment method for your small business. According to CardSwitcher, Paypal estimated the cost of cash to a small business equated to 12 man days or £942 a year – both are things your business can live without.

When accepting cash or cheques, you are signing yourself up to additional tasks such as counting and reconciling money. Not only that but you are also increasing the chance of employee theft occurring. In an ideal world, pilferage would never occur, but a poll revealed that employee theft costs British businesses almost £200 million a year.

There are plenty of reasons why every small business should make the transition to accepting card payments. Those SMEs who refrain from doing so risk falling behind and, in a world where businesses are constantly facing new challenges as well as stiff competition, it is a risk small businesses cannot afford to take.

If you are experiencing cash flow challenges or want to realise your business growth plans, get in touch with our team of Funding Specialists today on 020 7839 9451 or email [email protected].