We all trust our friends and family members to have our best interests in mind on a personal and social level. Many of us in business like to work with people we have long-standing relationships with because we have enough stress in our daily lives without shopping the competition. This ideology has led many people request merchant accounts from friends/family members or for friends/family members to pester us until we finally let them have our merchant account. While, businesses feel comfortable giving this to service to those who they know and trust, there may be potential downfalls:
1. The friend/family member won't shop their merchant account around because they won't want to ruin the relationship.
2. The more the friend/family member overcharges the business, the more profit they make monthly.
3. The friend/family member doesn't have to give priority service because they don't fear losing the merchant account.
At Ideal Cost, we do not want to ruin family and friend relationships so we do not have our clients leave their existing merchant account. Our clients are often surprised, however, that they have been overcharged thousands of dollars a year by a friend or family member. At Ideal Cost, we preserve relationships and money for our clients.
