Credit card readers (2022 version)

[Mike Blakesley]

Thanks to the "PCI" debacle a while ago and because I can't get any response out of Worldpay to help me with it, we are going to switch over to Heartland for processing and upgrade our credit card readers. I'm just wondering if anyone has any equipment recommendations. Since we have a ticket "window" rather than just a counter, I'd prefer to get something that can sit outside the window and connect wirelessly -- are there any pitfalls to those kind of readers?

Any other thoughts or recommendations would be appreciated.

[Rusty Gordon]

With Heartland (unlike Worldpay) you may be limited to devices they supply. I don't believe you can buy your own devices unless something has changed recently. One other thing, wireless devices will open you up to a whole lot more PCI compliance to deal with versus hardwired devices. Lastly, supply chain issues are softening, but most devices are in short supply.

[Gordon McLeod]

Will you be able to handle payments in Canada for our sysyems the ones we use with omniterm are RS232 or USB

[Chris Daigle]

We just did the same thing, swapped over from Worldpay to Heartland because of the increased PCI compliance issues that we couldn't get them to help us with. Switching to Heartland, we had to use equipment that worked with their system as well as our POS (RTS) so we got Ingenico Lane3000 machines (directly from Heartland) and so far no issues. The good thing about these readers is that they don't need a separate power cord as they get their power via USB. So a single USB cable connected to our POS system and it's good to go.

[Mike Blakesley]

The one I am looking at is the Lane 5000. Ingenico does make a wireless one, but Heartland doesn't support it.

[Marcel Birgelen]

In my experience, integrating wireless credit/debit/payment card processors into your POS is always a headache. Most cases I know about around here use them in stand-alone mode either on WiFi or 4G, where they have to enter the amounts into the machine and combine the transaction ticket of the payment processor with the actual ticket. Quite an administrative overhead and not really workable in your situation.

Most devices still expect some kind of RS232-connection with the POS, even if it's nowadays often "tunneled" over USB on more modern devices. Getting this to work over a wireless connection may be challenging, unless the device offers some kind of base-station/mobile unit solution and uses their own proprietary wireless communication to carry any communication between the POS and the payment terminal.

Also, you now have yet another device with batteries that can run flat.

So, although I don't know your particular situation, I guess drilling that hole for one or two cables is probably a more robust solution than the wireless option, if you can find one that's both compatible with your POS and payment processor anyway...

I've seen the Lane/5000 around here quite often, especially in Germany. For whatever reason, that particular machine consistently doesn't work with NFC on one of my credit cards. Probably nothing to worry about and may also be payment-processor related, but something odd I've recently observed.

[Mike Blakesley]

We got our new readers a few days ago. They are Lane 3000s, which are somewhat smaller than the 5000 but our counter is small so it’s ok. All working fine and customers love the tsp to pay feature. Haven’t had an Apple Pay transaction yet.

[Darin Steffl]

We're looking into Heartland and Worldpay if we switch to RTS but their rates are so high compared to my ISP business processor. But RTS charges high fees if we want to use an unsupported processor. It feels like there's no good choice because I pay extra no matter which option I choose.

Did they charge you for the new terminals or send them for free?

[Mike Blakesley]

We paid for them.