Credit Card Options For Bays

[washregal]

This is a crazy subject especially coming back from the ICA show your head starts spinning.

The big question is not when I am going to CC's for my wash's but what platform. Several out there charge you a nickle every time your customers make a transaction.. Don't like that Idea.

I need something simple that works and won't cost an arm and a leg. I do lik ethe features of free wash's on bithday's, fleet options, as well as benefits.

But do not want to pay an arm and a leg.

Also appreciate the ability to go online and check bay usage, as well as $$ per bay.

Anyone out there have any experience with these types of systems and solid recommendations?


I appreciate the response in advance.

 

[Ben's Car Wash]

last July I upgraded a 5 bay SS that I bought located adjecent to my Tunnel. I put in an I-Wash but opted not to go with their doors & timers in the bays because of what you mentioned, the DAN system and I already have CC clearing through Mercury Pay systems and did not want another CC clearing company. So I installed a Mark VII door (aquaspray) that has Unitec timers that allow me to use Wash Pay and select whatever CC clearing company I want without the extra .05 per transaction. I didn't cost any more than to have the I-Wash doors over the Mark VII doors with unitec's wash pay. You can also add wash pay separately to each bay in most cases at a reasonable price. I like the wash pay software and I ususally leave the report open for each bays equipment utilization all the time. It gives me what $ each bay is bringing in in real time and allows for fleet cards, gift cards, Credit cards along with bill aceptance (love it when I pull out a $20 from the stacker) and coins, tokens (slug buster 3) and dollar coins.

My recommendation is wash pay if you want to upgrade. A warning though.... credit card acceptance in SS washes are nothing like FS, EE or flex service. I do about 60% CC sales at my tunnel for average ticketprices that are 100-150% higher than the average cash sale. The SS credit card sales run about $6.50 (down from last years $7.60) over the average cash sale of $3.50 (please don't go into "how do you count cars", I'm only comparing "sales") So the CC usage in SS is much less frequent (mine is still at 7.5% compared to 60% at the tunnel) and less in ticket average (I'm about 80-90% over cash sale compared to 100-150% at the tunnel).

Cont. (dam-it Bill.... increase the characters to 4000!)

 

[Ben's Car Wash]

Cont. from above:

SS customers are different and I personally need to look for a way to encourage more CC usage at the SS wash. I plan on contacting my CC vendor for bigger signs and more marketing to increase sales & usage. Plastic always sells higher over cash, but the investment (some say as high as $2000 per bay to install CC aceptors) is huge, and if you only get 10% sales at 80% higher ticket, the ROI might be 3 years or longer!

Good luck, hopefully others have better ideas than I do.

 

[soapy]

I have had Etowah valleys quick pay system in for about a month. I checked a couple of my washes that are using them. Each has 3 SS bays and here are some figures from the first 10 days in April. My regular start up price is $2.50 for 4 and 1/2 minutes. Credit card usage is averaging $4.62 per use. It looks like we will do about $750 in CC per location for the first month. I am sure this will go up in time but seems like a good start to me. I can go on line daily and check usage per bay, find customer names who are using it and lots of other information. Each credit card is batched everyday so I only pay 1 transaction fee per credit card. Each swipe is not charged a transaction fee this way. Rather than just adding the credit card feature I went with a complete coin box that included a bill acceptor, timer, talking features etc. In bay bill acceptor usage is running between 25 to 30% of total income. It has a few features I have not started using yet such as bonus time for certain amount of money deposited, carwash bingo/lottery. Customer support has been great.

 

[eaglewash]

Soapy, do you use count up or count down

 

[bneckrock]

Soapy,

Do you have the Signature Series with the PLC? Were you able to interface easily?

Bill

 

[soapy]

I use the count down setup where the first card swipe charges the start up price of $2.50 and then each additional swipe is $1. Both are setable. When the first swipe is detected the wash starts and then it gets authorization for up to $15. THis authorization is usually in the first 20 seconds of the cycle. As additional swipes are added the amount is kept track of. At the end of the day each card is totaled and settled for the actual amount used. IF it it $4.50 that is what is billed to the card not the $15 authorized. By grouping them this way only one transaction fee is charged. It is the same thing that happens when you get gas. The card swipe usually authorizes up to $75 at the pump. WHen you put in $50 of gas that is all you end up getting charged.
You can use the count up method where it just runs up to a given amount while the bay is running and then they hit a stop button to stop the transaction. I chose not to do it this way however since I felt people may forget to reswipe the card to end the transaction time or hit a stop button.
I am waiting for the new face plates for my Ryko signature series SS wash. The new stuff has been ordered and just waiting to get in Jim's production schedule. It should be easy to wire in since all you basically are doing is replacing the current timer that ryko uses in the bays ( mine happens to be a time master). ALl the functions of the PLC will remain the same. The new timer just energizes the rotary switch the same as what the timer does now. The new etowah timer will also keep track of all the bills, qters etc. for audit purposes. Everything is prewired on the new face plates so all the wiring is hooking up about 10 wires for the different functions and adding a phone line.

 

[Kirb]

Soapy,
What is the fee for one $2.50 purchase or 10 $2.50 different card purchases in one day. I always thought they charged a fee per card(.20 to .25) and one batch fee per day.
Thanks,
Kirb

 

[soapy]

As I understand it there is a charge per each swipe of a card on these small purchase amounts. That is why the CC units batch them together to act as one card swipe. Etowah valley is not the only one that do it this way. Each processor will have their own per swipe charge and it will vary. Off the top of my head I can't remember what the costs are but will look it up and get ack to you.
I have to wonder if CC acceptance would be advisable if the start up fees were low like .50 cents to $1 like some areas fo the country still see.

 

[Earl Weiss]

I guess I am still trying to figure out why the SS industry setups aare so expensive and seemingly so complex. A taxi cab can install credit card acceptance, and naturaly it's wireless for about $250.00. I understand theat the SS industry woould require a couple of more things like a central hub for the credit cards to feed into and the interface with the timer, but it still seems a long way to $2000.00 per bay, and it eliminates the communication wiring for each bay.

As far as charges are concerned, coming from someone who sells gasoline (Do you ever pay for gas with a credit card?) The car wash industry has nothing to complain about.

 

[MEP001]

I guess I am still trying to figure out why the SS industry setups aare so expensive and seemingly so complex. A taxi cab can install credit card acceptance, and naturaly it's wireless for about $250.00.

There are millions of cabs all over the world, and the development and manufacture costs are more easily spread out among the individual units. There are a lot less self-serve bays, and most of the SS credit card manufacturers are small companies that pay a LOT of money to develop a system. Even Hamilton, compared to one of the leading taxicab credit card system manufacturers, is tiny.

Just for reference, I had an idea of my own in mind for a simple self-serve credit card system, and even though the off-the-shelf hardware used would cost about $200 a bay, the companies I talked to about building the software to run it wanted between $30,000 and $50,000.

 

[soapy]

For the limited info. I have from my march sales it looks like there is a 20 cent per card fee on MC and visa. Discover is .25 cents. A 20 cent charge per day for the batch is also charged.