Amazon Web Payment Service Added to payment page

[mouser]

I spent the better part of this afternoon adding Amazon Web Payments to the methods you can submit payments to the DC site.

My throat is sore from all the yelling and cursing I did at the computer screen.. It is a holy nightmare navigating the amazon.com web payment system website -- there are about 50 different logins for different aspects of different facets of their different payment services.. it's a total rats nest and one of the most convoluted and chaotic payment systems i have ever seen.  I had a hard time believing how badly organized it was.  That's being generous.  Really really horribly done.  For a company that got things so right with their normal site checkout, the developer side of things here is a total unmitigated failure.

Anyway..

It works, and it's up now.  I had to set a fixed amount for the amazon payment button and for the fundraiser i chose a large value ($50) but i put alternative buttons on the alternative payment page ($10, $25, $50, $100).  Maybe i'll lower the main button after the fundraiser.

It looks like the amazon web payment system makes payment really easy for users if they already have an amazon.com account, and it charges less of a fee than paypal, so that's all good.  If the payer doesn't have an amazon.com account however, it looks like it's going to make them set one up before letting the proceed to make a payment, which is pretty annoying.  In that respect paypal is still *much* better, as it lets people just fill in credit card info quickly for a one time payment.

[mahesh2k]

One more service you can add up is :

https://www.alertpay.com/index.aspx

[mouser]

I often get requests from people outside the US who can't use paypal.. there are 3 shareware payment services we support that i think should cover these people, but id be more interested in adding new payment services which specialize in international donors.

[gexecuter]

The only way to use Amazon Web Payments is trough a credit card right?

[mouser]

From http://www.amazon.co...y_meth?nodeId=513058:

Amazon.com accepts American Express, Diners Club, Discover, JCB, MasterCard, Eurocard, Visa, Visa Check Cards, payment from your bank account, Amazon.com gift cards, Amazon Store Card, and Webcertificates.

[bgd77]

I often get requests from people outside the US who can't use paypal.. there are 3 shareware payment services we support that i think should cover these people, but id be more interested in adding new payment services which specialize in international donors.

-mouser (March 13, 2009, 06:25 PM)

So that's why I wasn't able to use Paypal. 

It looks like the amazon web payment system makes payment really easy for users if they already have an amazon.com account, and it charges less of a fee than paypal, so that's all good. 

-mouser (March 13, 2009, 05:45 PM)

This new method of payment is very useful. I had no problems with amazon until now and the fact that we can use it and it charges less than paypal makes all your effort worthwhile.

[mahesh2k]

I often get requests from people outside the US who can't use paypal.. there are 3 shareware payment services we support that i think should cover these people, but id be more interested in adding new payment services which specialize in international donors.

Kagi and shareit services are not available here, but let's see that Plimus.

[bgd77]

For those that do want to donate using amazon, I used this service and I can tell you that it was ok. No problems, no hassles, you can try it with confidence.

It was hard for mouser to set it, but it is very easy for use to use it. 

[TheQwerty]

... and it charges less of a fee than paypal, so that's all good.

-mouser (March 13, 2009, 05:45 PM)

Is it possible to list the fees or an estimate on the Payment Method page, or does that break their TOS?

Without that knowledge I'd probably pick Paypal, but knowing you'd get more from the same amount if I used Amazon would immediately change my mind.

[mouser]

"Simple Pay" fees:
https://payments.ama...ss?sn=paynow/pricing

For Transactions >= $10:
   * 2.9% + $0.30 for all transactions
For Transactions < $10:
   * 5.0% + $0.05 for all transactions

Volume Discounts
    * 2.5% + $0.30 for all transactions for monthly payment volume from $3k-$10k
    * 2.2% + $0.30 for all transactions for monthly payment volume from $10k - $100k
    * 1.9% + $0.30 for all transactions for monthly payment volume over $100k


By comparison, Paypal is typically: 2.9% + $0.30 USD (but has similar volume discounts).

So the fees from paypal and Amazon simple pay are almost identical, and significantly better than shareware payment methods.