Vantiv Review

As both one of the largest and one of the oldest processors, Vantiv is very familiar with credit card processing for all kinds of businesses. But how do you know if they’re right for your business? You can take a look at reviews from other customers (and we’ll include info on that here) but you’ll also need to consider services they offer, rates and fees, contract terms, and customer service. Choose from the options in the menu below to jump right to that section or continue reading for all the details on Vantiv’s fees, processing services, reviews, and more.

• History
• News
• What services can Vantiv offer?
  • Card Processing
  • Ecommerce
  • Mobile Processing
  • Checks
  • Prepaid Solutions
  • Developer Tools
• Does Vantiv offer loans or other financing?
• What about equipment?
• How secure is Vantiv?
• What are the rates and fees?
  • Chargeback Service Fee
• Is there a contract?
• How is customer service?
• Vantiv Reviews from Customers
  • Reviews with the Better Business Bureau
  • Complaints at Ripoff Report and Yelp
• Awards for Vantiv

History

Vantiv was founded in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1970, originally under the name Midwest Payment Systems. The company changed its name to Fifth Third Processing Solutions until 2011, when they became Vantiv. Vantiv was listed as the 2013 Nilson Report’s largest PIN debit acquirer in the United States. The company processes $46 billion in transactions for more than 100,000 businesses. In 2014, Vantiv expanded further by acquiring Mercury Payment Systems.

News

In early 2016, Vantiv announced the rebranding of Mercury Payment Systems and Element Payment Services as Vantiv Integrated Payments. If you use Mercury or Element, you can expect to start seeing those companies referred to as Vantiv Integrated Payments.           

November 2016 - Vantiv annoucnes that it will purchase payment processing company Moneris. More details to come.

What services can Vantiv offer?

Vantiv offers card processing, an e-commerce payment gateway, mobile processing, check processing, and prepaid solutions. Vantiv can also let you accept payment in multiple currencies, in case you have international customers.

Card Processing

If there’s a card out there, you can probably take it with Vantiv. The company supports almost all major cards including Visa, MasterCard, Discover, American Express, and Fleet cards such as Voyager, Wright Express, and Fleet One. Additionally, you can take PIN debit cards on almost all major networks, including Jeanie, AFFN, Alaska Option, Accel, Interlink, Maestro, NYCE, Pulse, Star, and more. You can even choose if you’d like to accept EBT cards.

E-Commerce

Got a website and want to let customers buy from you directly online? Vantiv offer e-commerce with a gateway called e-Commerce Plus or you can get set up with the popular Authorize.Net gateway. Both gateways can integrate with your website and shopping carts, allowing your customers to easily and securely pay for what they buy on your website. You can even take international payments from customers outside the United States if you want.

Mobile Processing

If you’re looking to take payments on the go using your smartphone or tablet, Vantiv offers Vantiv Mobile Accept. It doesn’t matter if you prefer Apple or Android systems, because Vantiv Mobile Accept works with iPhones, iPads, and Android devices. You can combine the Vantiv mobile app with a card reader to swipe cards at the time of payment instead of keying. Transactions are faster and less expensive when swiped, and payments are secured with encryption.

Checks

Checks are still going strong, and Vantiv has several solutions if you want to take checks at your business.

Check 21
If you take checks by mail, Check21 could be for you. It captures images of checks to process faster by converting the check to an image. Imaged checks don’t require a trip to the bank, feature a guaranteed payment option, and come with online reporting for tracking activity.

Electronic Check Conversion
Electronic Check Conversion (ECC) converts paper checks to electronic transactions, allowing real-time authorizations to reduce the risk of bounced checks. ECC doesn’t require a trip to the bank, and funds are usually deposited within 48 hours. Online reporting can be used for reviewing transactions.

Paper Guarantee
Vantiv’s Paper Guarantee is the option to choose if you want to accept paper checks and deposit them at your bank. Paper Guarantee lets you take those paper checks but still have guaranteed payment so that you don’t need to worry about bounced checks and lost funds. Paper Guarantee features real time authorizations and online reporting.

Prepaid Solutions

Vantiv’s prepaid solutions include reload gift cards, incentive programs, and rebates. Prepaid programs are flexible and can be tailored to your needs. Gift cards can be designed using existing templates or by creating your own customized artwork. Programs feature online ordering and reporting, and 24 hour customer service.

Developer Tools

Vantiv offers an entire separate website for developers, including API documentation, articles, and support for integrating payments in e-commerce and mobile payments scenarios.

Does Vantiv offer loans or other financing?

Yes. Vantiv has two options: cash advances and small business loans. With cash advances, you can repay as your business grows. There are no required monthly payments. The small business loan option includes fixed repayment which is automatically deducted from your account. Repayment terms for business loans vary from 3 months to 2 years.

Both cash advances and loans can be used for almost any business reason. If you need to buy equipment, expand, purchase additional inventory, open a second (or third or fourth!) branch, or build an e-commerce website, Vantiv can help with funding.

What about equipment?

Vantiv provides several options for point-of-sale equipment, including dial, high-speed, Bluetooth, and wireless. Vantiv currently offers the following models:

Dialup or High-Speed Internet Connection Terminals
These terminals plug into a standard phone line or connect via the internet for transaction processing.

• VeriFone Vx 520
• Ingenico iCT220
• Ingenico iCT250

Bluetooth
Bluetooth options give the benefit of high-speed without being restricted to a fixed location.

• Ingenico iWL222
• Ingenico iWL252

Wireless
Wireless options let you process payments anywhere around the store or restaurant.

• Ingenico iWL255
• Verifone Vx 680

Available terminals are subject to change.

How secure is Vantiv?

As one of the largest payment processors, Vantiv takes security seriously. Vantiv dedicates a page of its website to explaining the range of security features available. The company helps protect customer data using encryption, tokenization, and e-commerce security. Additionally, Vantiv helps you adopt PCI best practices using PCI Assist to make sure you’re compliant.

Vantiv’s Breach Assist can protect you from financial losses if there is a security breach. Vantiv provides an indemnification waiver against losses up to $100,000 per location or $500,000 per incident. Breach Assist can help with expenses such as audits, card replacement, credit monitoring, fines, and account data recovery costs. $25,000 is also included for upgrades to hardware or software after breaches.

In autumn 2015, Vantiv announced a fraud toolkit for ecommerce transactions. The fraud toolkit helps you prevent fraudulent transactions and the costs that come with them. You can detect and prevent fraud before it happens by using Vantiv’s usage monitoring. Usage monitoring detects unusual spending patterns that can indicate a card has been stolen. But if a bad payment does get through, you’ll be able to refund the confirmed fraudulent transactions before they become chargebacks.

The toolkit is available in three service levels: Basic, Advanced Best Practices, and Advanced Custom.
The Basic package includes common tools such as address verification and card verification.
The Advanced Best Practices package includes the tools found in the Basic package, plus advanced features such as device fingerprinting and fraud scoring.
The Advanced Custom package includes all of the features of the Advanced Best Practices package, plus access to a Vantiv fraud consultant who monitors fraud trends and works with you to customize your fraud filters and rules for maximum fraud prevention based on your specific business and possible places for fraud. Advanced Custom also includes a dedicated online console so you can adjust your tools and parameters as necessary in real time.

What are the rates and fees?

Vantiv doesn’t publish rates or fees on their website. Interchange-plus pricing may be available, but be sure that you’re aware of all the charges you can expect.

The best way to get accurate, up-to-date pricing is to create a free CardFellow profile and then request a quote from Vantiv. Your Vantiv quote through CardFellow will show you all the pricing so you can compare processors and pay the least for processing.

Chargeback Service Fee T1

In July of 2017, Vantiv instituted a monthly "chargeback service fee t1." Instead of incurring a chargeback fee only in the event of a chargeback, the fee would be assessed monthly for all businesses. The following announcement was listed on processing statements:

"Effective August 1, 2017, you will be assessed a $5.00 monthly Chargeback Service fee. You will no longer be charged for chargebacks per occurrence. This flat fee covers all chargebacks you receive in a given month."

If you have a direct account with Vantiv, you’ll likely see this fee on your monthly processing statement. If you work with a Vantiv reseller (an ISO), that reseller can decide if they’re going to pass along the fee to your business. While the Vantiv statement above indicates a $5 monthly fee, the actual chargeback service fee will vary depending on your processor. Check your monthly statement or contact your processor to find out if you’re being charged and how much.

Confusingly, Vantiv also announced on statements that the per-occurrence fee for chargebacks is going up by $10 for businesses that have had a chargeback in the past 12 months. The exact wording is:

"Effective August 1, 2017, your chargeback fee will be increased by $10 per chargeback occurrence."

These two statements seem contradictory, since one message says that there is no longer a fee for chargebacks per occurrence, and one states that the per-occurence chargeback fee is going up. We’ve reached out to Vantiv for clarification and will update this section when more details become available.

Is there a contract?

Yes. Vantiv’s standard contract is for 3 years and automatically renews. An early termination fee up to $295 applies. Seasonal downtime may be available. Remember, terms and fees can change, so be sure to read your Vantiv contract fully before signing anything.

How is customer service?

It’s open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can call or use the online live chat feature whenever you need help. Additionally, Vantiv offers a support video library that includes tutorials and how-to guides for common issues. However, customer service is a frequent point in negative reviews online, which state that the hold times to reach an agent are long and that customer service can be rude and unhelpful.

Vantiv Reviews from Customers

Vantiv’s online reputation includes quite a few reviews complaining about customer service and problems when trying to cancel their accounts. Keep in mind that an individual review is just that, and your experience may differ.

Profile and Vantiv reviews with the Better Business Bureau

As of autumn 2015, Vantiv, LLC is not accredited with the Better Business Bureau but does have a profile with the BBB. The company currently has an A+ rating, the highest available. Vantiv has had 61 complaints closed with the BBB in the past 3 years. The complaints are split almost evenly, with 30 complaints in the category "Problems with Product/Service" and 27 complaints in the "Billing/Collection Issues" category. The remaining 4 complaints are in the "Advertising/Sales Issues" category

Complaints allege that the company continued to charge fees after account cancellation, expensive early termination fees, unauthorized debits, hidden fees, and unexplained costs.

29 complaints are listed as resolved, meaning that Vantiv replied to the complaint and the customer was satisfied with the resolution. The other 32 complaints are unresolved, but marked as answered, meaning the BBB felt that Vantiv addressed the customer’s complaint but the customer was not satisfied with the solution or stopped participating in the complaint resolution process.

There are also 5 customer reviews for Vantiv on the Better Business Bureau website. 1 review is listed as “neutral” but checked “would not recommend” to the question of whether the customer would suggest Vantiv to others. The neutral complaint alleges poor communication especially regarding chargebacks. The other 4 complaints are listed as “negative” and also checked off “would not recommend.” The negative reviews complain of long hold times for customer service, getting hung up on once reaching customer service, high fees, and difficulty cancelling accounts.

Complaints at Ripoff Report and Yelp

There are 3 reports in the Ripoff Report directory for Vantiv, complaining of expensive billing errors, unauthorized debits, and continuing to charge even after account cancellation.

There are also 3 negative reviews (all 1-star) for Vantiv at Yelp. Reviews complain of rude customer service and long hold times, charges after account cancellation, and expensive cancellation fees.

Awards for Vantiv

Vantiv lists the following awards on their website:

• #1 Ranked US Merchant Acquirer in PIN debit transactions
• #2 Ranked US Merchant Acquirer in transaction growth (2010 - 2011)
• #3 Ranked US Merchant Acquirer in total transactions

Additionally, Vantiv’s website states that the company has received 24 Quality Service and Data Integrity awards from Visa and MasterCard.

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