Etowah Valley vs. BluePay

[lighthousecarwash]

Noticed last night that my Etowah Valley meters have not self checked since Friday. I see that I have no transactions, but since we had rain all weekend, I was not sure if it was a true issue. I called Amanda today and she said other owners were having problems and they were looking into it. She called back tonight and said that their end is good and that I needed to call Jim. Seems like this happens everytime there is an issue. It's not our fault, it's their fault. EV of course says the same thing. Is anyone else having problems and if so did you call Jim or BluePay? Did you get any different answers than I did?

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[steve569]

I talked to Amanda on Wednesday morning and she said that it was Bluepays problem and they were working to resolve it. I also am frustrated with with this system, there should be a better way to track down a problem than having to make multiple phone calls with all the finger pointing. I have wished more than once that I would have invested in a system from a larger company with more than one tech guy. Jim from Etowah Valley is a great guy and will do all he can to help you but he is just a one man show and he is very busy. Have you ever wondered how long you would be able to get support for your system if something happened to Jim or if he decided to retire? I got off track there for a minute, hopefully Buepay will get things resolved quickly.

 

[lighthousecarwash]

Steve,
I was told that they have the issue resolved as of 3:00PM this afternoon. My system however, is still not pushing transactions through. I know that it may take a couple days to get them to dial back so I am going to wait it out until tomorrow afternoon and see if they start to clear out.

On another note, I talked to Jim today and voiced my frustration with some of this stuff. Basically, we need options. We should have options as to which processor we use, and how we interface the processor. When I installed this system, it was perfect for my application. Now that my car wash has evolved somewhat, I would like to be able to migrate over to processing over the internet. I am trying to get him to just have the option on the timers where if you have dial up, we can do that, if you have internet, we can do that, if you want wireless, we can do that. I know it will probably add expense to the system, but being scalable to your customers could be a huge marketing boost for EV.

BTW....are you the one with the Razor in Clinton?

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[Earl Weiss]

FWIW. I use Cryptopay thru First Data. Did not get an August report. Called the yesterday and was told it went out on 9/2 (Sunday???) Anyway it came via e-mail later that day. Can't help but wonder if the Holiday weekend caused some delay.

 

[steve569]

Lighthouse Yes I am the one with the Razors. I am posting this at noon on Thursday My system still does not work and I believe that the phone line is to blame. You can switch it to the test number and it works fine. I have called the phone company to see if they have switched it to least cost routing again. Why don't you PM your phone number to me and we can compare notes when something happens

 

[lighthousecarwash]

As of today, I have the exact same issue. I changed to the 800 number and I'm processing again. I called on Wednesday and requested that they re-route my long distance trunks again. So if they did that and the 630 number is still not working, then I'm not so sure that BluePay has their issue resolved. Very frustrating. I gonna keep an eye on them and see if they system check tonight. If so, I am going to transition a couple meters back to the 630 number and see if they work before rolling them all back.

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[sparkey]

You do know that Etoway Valley systems can now use TSYS. I switched mine over and it seems to be working pretty good. I still need to see a bill or two to find out exactly how much I saved.

 

[lighthousecarwash]

Yes, I have heard that. Jim said that he switched one of his systems over and his fees have actually been a little higher than BluePay. It seems that you can also use a 800 number with BluePay, but they will charge you a fee for using it. Guess you would just have to see how it pencils out. I just added high speed internet to my wash and bundled it with my phone service. I now get up to 10M internet and unlimited LD, so either way will not really affect my phone bill.

The other issue with TSYS is that my American Changer for my IBA will not be PCI compliant with TSYS over the internet...or so I was told.

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[sparkey]

I'm not sure I buy the higher fees. The quotes I got from TSYS showed a significant savings and the 800 number is free. I am new to TSYS though so I will have to wait and see. I did talk to another wash on this forum that switched a few months ago and he indicated he was seeing a significant savings.

 

[lighthousecarwash]

Let me know and I will switch ASAP! The 10% it ends up being now is outrageous and that does not include what the LD costs. If it really is a big savings then I will for sure be switching. Jim just said that it was actually higher fees than BluePay on one of his washes, but who knows what kind of deals he gets with BluePay.

Lighthouse.

 

[sparkey]

Let me know and I will switch ASAP! The 10% it ends up being now is outrageous and that does not include what the LD costs. If it really is a big savings then I will for sure be switching. Jim just said that it was actually higher fees than BluePay on one of his washes, but who knows what kind of deals he gets with BluePay.

Lighthouse.

Send me your email and I will send you the quote I got from TSYS. It showes a breakdown of a monthly statement from bluepay and with TSYS it is suppose to save me 62%. I also had to pay for a premium phone package for unlimited long distance that I have since got rid of.

 

[lighthousecarwash]

Sent you a PM...thx.

Lighthouse

 

[lighthousecarwash]

So I just did some quick calculations from last months statement. With BluePay, I am currently paying 10.3%. When I add my total phone bill into the fees, I am running at 16%. Obviously, I can't completely eliminate my phone bill, but I could drastically reduce it with a 800 number. I would assume that I could get it around $40/month instead of $85, which would get me around 12-13%. That just seems rediculous to me. My local bank was processing for my IBA and it was running at 6.9%. What exactly is a "good" rate?

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[Earl Weiss]

As of today, I have the exact same issue. I changed to the 800 number and I'm processing again. I called on Wednesday and requested that they re-route my long distance trunks again. So if they did that and the 630 number is still not working, then I'm not so sure that BluePay has their issue resolved. Very frustrating. I gonna keep an eye on them and see if they system check tonight. If so, I am going to transition a couple meters back to the 630 number and see if they work before rolling them all back.

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

FWIW we had lots of issues with CC over the phone at one location . (Not a Blue Pay System) Nothing solved it . Because I got the Cryptopay we had to go the internet route. Issue resolved. Can you try that?

 

[kleenzcars]

I had problems last week too. My modem/timers stopped communicating with Blue Pay after August 31. On September 1 I started looking for the problem. I researched phone connections, Blue Pay and even the equipment itself. I ruled out the equipment as each modem at 2 locations stopped working at the same time. Phone company (Century Link) technicians advised me that since I had a dial tone and no obvious static that they weren't the problem. I phoned Jim at Etowah Valley who was tremendously helpful in walking me through several trouble-shooting steps. Ultimately Blue Pay did have a problem with the way phone calls were received at their location in Chicago, however a second problem was discovered with Century Link long distance service. Apparently sometimes the routing they map for LD calls have poor connections and once I connected with a knowledgeable person, they were able to re-route the calls from my timers to the Blue Pay number. Within minutes of her changing the routing of my calls, the connections started working as designed. I still have issues with what I feel are extremely high charges from Blue Pay for their processing, but at least I am operating again.

 

[lighthousecarwash]

I am up and running again too. I also had to call CenturyLink and have them re-route my lines. I just got my statements from BluePay for last month, and it's running right at 10%. Just makes me cringe. I know that some people have switched to TSYS. I have a few questions about their setup though. Do you still have the ability to see the system checks and each transaction like you do on the BluePay gateway? Do they have a virtual terminal that I can use to run a credit card for token purchases or things like that? I don't use this stuff often, but if I can't see the system checks, then it could be several days before I know that I have an issue and that could be very bad.

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

 

[Greg Pack]

I am up and running again too. I also had to call CenturyLink and have them re-route my lines. I just got my statements from BluePay for last month, and it's running right at 10%. Just makes me cringe. I know that some people have switched to TSYS. I have a few questions about their setup though. Do you still have the ability to see the system checks and each transaction like you do on the BluePay gateway? Do they have a virtual terminal that I can use to run a credit card for token purchases or things like that? I don't use this stuff often, but if I can't see the system checks, then it could be several days before I know that I have an issue and that could be very bad.

Thanks,
Lighthouse.

Keep us posted on fees when you get the new statement. Thanks!