The general public tends to believe the falsehood that an open-source payment gateway does not cost anything. If a new company doesn’t have much money to spend on payment processing, one option is to use an open-source solution. This however, is not the reality.
There are no free, open-source payment processing solutions.
A PCI-compliant payment gateway is required even if you “accidentally” find a free open-source one. The product must also be cluster-deployed. However, you should keep at least four or five nodes online at all times. On top of that, you’ll need to establish a partnership with a new acquiring bank. So, acquirer integration is something you’ll need to go through. The next step is to create a system for accepting new merchants, establishing their accounts, and reconciling their payments. Additionally, new integrations and EMV certifications will be necessary if you want new terminal options.
Open Source Payment Gateway: Fees
In most cases, there are three main factors that go into the overall amount a merchant pays to the payment gateway provider: (fee types):
- Costs associated with using the gateway (such as, transaction fees). Direct interfaces with Visa and/or MasterCard are required to avoid incurring any exchange or settlement fees. However, in our opinion and based on the results of our studies, such direct integrations are only worthwhile when dealing with extremely high processing volumes.
- Surcharges levied by a bank that uses the gateway as an acquiring institution can be reduced. An acquirer will charge you fees based on the number of transactions they handle and the terms of your agreement with them.
- The fee imposed by the processor (reimbursement to credit card companies like Visa and Mastercard for the privilege of using their networks). However, reducing the processing fee paid to card companies for network usage is tricky.
Consequently, it is only worthwhile to bring an open source payment gateway solution in-house (or design a product from scratch) if the savings from the removal of some gateway-related fees outweigh the yearly expenses of gateway maintenance, PCI audits, certifications, etc. You can only do this if your processing volumes are very high. A payment gateway of your own becomes a viable choice if reality checks and estimations reveal yearly savings of $200,000.
Our newly released cost-cutting guidelines address specific areas of expense associated with transaction processing.
The UniPay Platform and How It Functions
The UniPay Gateway is an open-source, white label payment processing system. It has a plethora of technological features that are essential for modern enterprises. They include 3D Secure, EMV, P2PE, various forms of payment cards, and ACH transactions. UniPay also allows you to handle foreign payments through a variety of worldwide connectors, among other things.
The software package provides integration logic as well as several PayFac-related capabilities. Several connectors have already integrated recurring billing functionality and chargeback management algorithms. With UniPay open-source code, you get omnichannel payment solutions and EMV terminals you can trust. You may also license the relevant software and have access to code that has been tailored to meet your specific business requirements.
UniPay customers include Fortune 500 organizations. The key advantage of our platform is that it is not limited to huge corporations. Our solution includes options even for customers who can only pay a tiny monthly price.
Open-Source Commercial Payment Processor
When compared to proprietary commercial software or developing one’s own payment solution, a commercial open source payment system offers several advantages. It might be difficult to create a completely effective payment gateway while working alone, but when you go for open source, you have access to a wealth of guarantees and assistance. In addition to liability protection, the amount of support you require, cost benefits, warranties, and total freedom, open source payment solutions include regular changes depending on your requirements and the requirements of others.
Commercial Open Source Payment Gateway's Advantages
Due to the critical nature of a payment solution, it is crucial to select an appropriate payment gateway. This infographic shows the different benefits you might get from switching to commercial open source software, which makes it a good choice to think about when choosing a payment system.
Get in touch with us if setting up your own payment gateway is something you’re really considering.