|  | | | Frequently Asked Questions about our e-commerce site service- Q: How many products can I sell on the site?
- A: You may sell as many products as you like, arranged into as many categories and subcategories as you like.
- Q: Who receives payment for the products?
- A: You do. When someone purchases a product on-line, they are given a number of options on how they may pay, including cheque by post, and instant payment services if they have been set up. Once they have confirmed payment, you will be notified by email immediately. You should wait, of course, for confirmation that payment has been received before you dispatch any goods.
- Q: How are the Internet payment services set up?
- A: The most simple method of enabling payment on the Internet is to use PayPal. This service is widely used in the on-line auctions community, is free to set up and allows buyers to purchase your goods via their credit card or debit card in a number of currencies including UK Sterling, US Dollar, and of course the Euro. As there are no set-up costs involved PayPal can be the most viable solution for low to medium sales volumes. However, there are some issues to consider, the primary one being that as PayPal allows your customers to pay directly via credit card, they (the customers) are entitled under consumer credit protection laws to cancel the transaction after you have dispatched the goods. This ‘chargeback’ system therefore lends itself to considerable abuse and can result in you losing both money and products.
There are also several alternative UK currency on-line payment services such as NoCHex that are not reversible because they are based on ‘hard’ cash rather than credit facilities, and these may be more appropriate to your requirements. However the drawback of these is that the customer must initially register and verify his authenticity before he can conduct his first transaction, and this process can take up to several days. For repeat customers, this is only likely to be a minor inconvenience, but it may put off ‘impulse’ buyers.
The best compromise at present appears in the form of MoneyBookers who operate a chargeback protection system which guarantees the payment of all transactions. Payments can be made by credit card by unregistered customers but does require them to obtain an authorisation code by phone at the time of the transaction. The obvious flaw with this method is that if the customer is on-line then it is likely that he won’t be able to phone them unless he has a mobile phone to hand as well.
It is therefore advisable to have a mixture of payment methods available to cater for as many situations as possible. We will discuss these issues in more detail with you once you have signed up with us.
PLEASE NOTE: This aspect of the service must (of course) be set up by you for reasons of security, but the process is quick and we will walk you through the various stages step-by-step.
- Q: Do you take any commission on my sales?
- A: No. We do not get involved in your sales transactions in any way.
- Q: How do I add and amend products on the site?
- A: You can easily do this yourself, or we can do it for you for a small charge.
- Q: If I add and amend products on the site myself do I have to pay extra?
- A: No, our monthly charge is based on the amount of work that we have to undertake initially to get the site up and running. If you choose to add or delete product lines yourself then it makes no difference to us as long as you continue to pay the monthly charge.
- Q: How long does it take to set up my site?
- A: Typically it will take up to two weeks to get a everything up and running smoothly, although it can be achieved in much less time if certain elements are already in place. Two of the main bottlenecks are beyond our control, they are (1) the time delay necessary to get a domain name established and (2) the time delay in getting the secure payment systems set up.
- Q: How quickly can I expect to start selling my products online?
- A: A lot depends on how you promote your new outlet to your existing and potential customers. For example, you should add your new web site address to all of your stationery and marketing materials as soon as you can. You may wish to announce ‘special offers’ for all orders made on-line. There is no hard and fast rule about this, but usually the pattern is that a few sales are made within the first month, these gradually pick up as your marketing materials propagate, and within six months you should be achieving good results.
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