For businesses looking to establish themselves with an eCommerce website, there are steps to take before you can accept the first customer payment. Card brands, like Visa and Mastercard, take their customer security and shopping experience seriously, and following their guidelines will be the first step to setting up a successful eCommerce site. In addition, there may be local or federal regulations that require additional information on your website. So before you go live with an eCommerce site, it’s important to take the proper steps to ensure you have a smooth launch.
Who are you and what products do you provide?
The first thing a customer should see on your website is your business name (DBA). It’s important that the name is clear enough to match what customers may see on their credit card statement. Make sure your products are clearly listed with descriptions, cost, and whatever currency you chose to operate in. If you only accept one kind of currency, make sure to use the appropriate currency mark so customers understand what they are paying.
Encryption
When your customers input their financial information, it is necessary that your page is secure and encrypted. The lock icon in the URL is there for a reason. Your payment processor should always provide a secure payment gateway. If your site hosts the payment page, there are options, such as Gravity’s emergepay which allows you to use payment fields or a modal on your website but keeps any payment data from actually hitting your website. This keeps you PCI compliant and ensures your customers’ data is secure and does not make its way around the internet.
Shipping & Payment
Make sure that your website clearly states what your policies are for shipping your products.
- Do you offer shipping?
- Do you ship internationally or only ship within the United States?
- Can a customer pay for quicker shipping?
These are all questions you want to answer for your customer. If you need specific examples of what to write you can visit the following site for a free shipping and payment information template. The site also provides information on adjusting the wording of this policy, as well as general shipping rate information.
https://www.termsfeed.com/blog/sample-shipping-policy-template/#Download_Shipping_Policy_Template
Return and Refund Policy
Having a clear policy for refunds, returns, and order cancellations is required by major credit card brands. This can reduce the amount of chargebacks and must be clearly stated before a customer checks out. The policy can either be clearly stated near the checkout or submit button or it can be linked to another page where the customer must manually accept that they have read the policy. The success of chargeback disputes will be drastically diminished if either of these options are not in place. If you need help writing your own policy, you can find a generic template here.
Remember to adjust the information to match your company’s return policy.
Customer Service Info
Is there anything worse than a scorned customer? Make sure if your customers have any issues with your product, you have customer service information clearly stated so they take their questions or concerns to you, instead of to the internet. Be sure to include contact information, including a phone number and email address, so there are multiple avenues to contact customer service.
Privacy Policy
The point of a Privacy Policy is to inform the customer how your business will gather and use their data. A Privacy Policy is required by law and is a legal document that should include what data you’re collecting, how you’re collecting it, why you are collecting it, and how you will use the data. Privacy Policies can typically be found in the footer of a website. You can find help creating your Privacy Policy here: https://www.privacypolicygenerator.info/
Terms & Conditions
Every website needs Terms & Conditions. They generally include information about licenses, disclaimers, and cookies. It’s important to review your Terms & Conditions to make sure they are accurate for your company. To find help creating your own, you can click here: https://www.termsandconditionsgenerator.com/
The Next Steps
If you are ready to start taking payments online and need to get your eCommerce site in tip-top shape, Gravity Payments can help. From eCommerce, brick and mortar, mobile or via Point of Sale (POS), Gravity has a solution for your business.
