CDGcommerce Review: Keep Your Processing Costs To A Minimum

CDGcommerce is a merchant account provider offering 20 years of experience in top-notch merchant services to small- and medium-sized businesses. With a special focus on eCommerce businesses, CDG also provides a full range of products and services for retail merchants as well.

CDGcommerce currently serves over 20,000 merchants, maintaining a client retention rate of over 97% for more a decade. These numbers show that you’ll most likely have a great experience if you choose to go with CDG.

CDGcommerce Products & Services

CDGcommerce covers a wide range of merchants, but the company is particularly keen on eCommerce and small- to mid-sized businesses. Merchants can benefit from the products and services below.

• Merchant Accounts. Like many of its peers in the industry, CDG is not a direct processor. Instead, the company partners with at least one backend processor to handle your transactions as well as getting the funds to you. To keep costs low, CDGcommerce does not accept high-risk merchants. Feel free to consult with a sales representative to make sure your business does not fall in this category before you apply.
• Payment Gateway. Merchants have the option to choose between CDG’s Quantum payment gateway or Authorize.net. Both gateways are free to use – there is no setup fee, no monthly gateway fee, and no extra transaction fee. In comparison, you’ll have to pay a $25 gateway fee per month, an additional $0.10 per transaction fee and a daily batch fee of $0.10, if you sign up with Authorize.net directly.
• Merchant Portal. Most merchant account providers in the industry will include online reporting tools. However, CDGcommerce goes many steps further by providing detailed account information, chargeback/fraud warnings, automated alerts, real-time reporting, historical trends and graphs, QuickBooks integration and more.
• Point of Sale. The CDG POS+ is a low cost yet powerful system. It features no up front cost, training and 24/7 live support, lifetime equipment coverage, unlimited software upgrades, employee management, real-time inventory tracking and more. While other systems could easily cost $10,000 – $20,000, the CDG POS+ is only $39 per month, with a risk-free 30-day trial available.
• Credit Card Terminal. With CDGcommerce, each merchant account gets one credit card terminal for an annual insurance fee of $79 to cover loss, damage, and upgrades. This works out to just $6.58 a month, substantially less than what a traditional terminal lease would cost you. Obviously, when you close your account, you’ll also need to return the equipment. CDG currently offers the Verifone VX520 credit card terminal and the wireless S90 (additional wireless carrier cost of $20/month plus $0.05 per transaction). 
• USB Card Reader. If you have an existing workstation, then you might opt for the free USB card reader that’s compatible with both PC and Mac computers. All you have to do is plug it in and it’s ready to go!
• Terminal Re-Program. CDGcommerce offers free re-programming for just about any terminal equipment on the market and a free PIN pad swap out as well. As long as your existing equipment isn’t propriety (like most First Data terminals) and it meets PCI PTS requirements, CDG can have you up and running in just 15 minutes once you activate your account.
• Mobile Card Reader. CDG offers the ProcessNow app and card reader for merchants who need to process payments on the go. Both the software and the hardware are free. The app works with iOS and Android, as well as a variety of smartphones and tablets. ProcessNow has single screen payment entry, automatic tip calculation and inventory management capability. Receipts can be emailed or printed with a compatible receipt printer connected via Bluetooth.
• Security Service. CDGcommerce calls its security service, “cdg360.” This optional feature is $15 per month and includes data breach insurance up to $100,000, PCI-DSS vulnerability scans, customized security alerts, staff awareness training and a Merchant Trust seal for your website.

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Pricing

While other processing companies avoid publishing any pricing information online, CDG has a Pricing page on its website with all the nitty-gritty details of its pricing plans. These plans are classified into two main categories: simplified and advanced.

Although simplified plans are available to all merchants, regardless of monthly processing volume, it was designed for small businesses that process less than $10,000 a month.

On the other hand, advanced pricing is only available to merchants who process over $10,000 a month and offers interchange-plus pricing, as well as discounted rates for businesses that handle higher volumes.

Simplified Pricing

Those that use simplified pricing pay one of two different rates for each transaction. These two rates are categorized as qualified and non-qualified. This is standard for tiered pricing plans.

Most merchant account providers will only advertised their qualified rates (which are lower) and conveniently omit their non-qualified numbers. CDGcommerce, in contrast, fully discloses its non-qualified rates and provides examples of types of transactions where the higher rates will apply.

Check out an overview of rates for CDG’s simplified pricing plans below:

Simplified Pricing Plans

Plan Type	Qualified Transaction Fee	Non-Qualified Transaction Fee
POS	1.70% + $0.25	2.90% + $0.30
Swipe	1.70% + $0.25	2.90% + $0.30
Online	1.95% + $0.30	2.95% + $0.30
Mobile	1.70% + $0.25	2.90% + $0.30

Non-qualified transactions include keyed-in sales, international, corporate and premium cards. I’d also like to point out that CDGcommerce’s non-qualified rates are on par with other payment service providers, like Square.

Advanced Pricing

Advanced pricing offers discounts to nonprofit organizations and businesses with over $10,000 a month in processing volume. The advanced pricing rates below apply to all merchants (POS, swipe, online and mobile).  

Processing Volume	Transaction Fee
$10,000 – $25,000	Interchange + 0.30% + $0.10
$25,001 – $50,000	Interchange + 0.25% + $0.10
$50,001 – $100,000	Interchange + 0.20% + $0.10
Non-Profit	Interchange + 0.20% + $0.10

If you process more than $100,000 a month, you’ll have to contact CDG for custom pricing. Of course, expect to pay lower rates than what you see above.

Other Fees

This is what really sets CDGcommerce apart from the competition. The company has one of the most affordable fee schedules you’ll find in the industry.

Fee Type	Cost	Details
Account Support Fee	$10/month	Required for all accounts
cdg360	$15/month	Optional

CDGcommerce does not charge the following fees:

Account Setup Fee	Annual Fee	Gateway Fee
Monthly Minimum Fee	PCI Compliance Fee	AVS Fee
TIN/1099K IRS Reporting Fee		Early Termination Fee

For a small business, this can mean significant savings over what you would be paying with most providers. The account setup fee alone usually costs $100 or more. Gateway fees normally start around $15 a month, on top of the per-transaction charge, and you usually have to pay around $99 a year for PCI compliance fees.

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Customer Support & Satisfaction

CDG provides telephone support via a toll-free number 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Live chat is available, but only during regular business hours. You also have the option to contact CDGcommerce via email, and you’ll get a response within 24 hours. Reviews from merchants show that they’re happy with the quality of care from the CDG customer support team.

If you want to help yourself, head over to the company’s eCommerce Resource Center which provides some useful documents for setting up the Quantum or Authorize.net gateway. It also offers several educational articles, including a breakdown of merchant account fees. I’d like to see CDG expand its knowledge base in the future to include additional informational posts.

Since 2007, CDGcommerce has been accredited by the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and currently holds an A+ rating. The company has only received five complaints within the past three years, and one in the last 12 months. That’s an incredible feat for a provider of its size.

The majority of complaints against CDG has to do with funding holds. Of course, it’s annoying for money not to get through to you. However, the fault lies not on CDGcommerce, but on the backend processor. Even though this is the case, CDG will do its best to try and resolve your funding hold issues.

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Contract & Closing

CDGcommerce offers month-to-month billing with no long-term contract to sign and no early termination fees to pay. In comparison, most typical merchant account contracts have an initial term of three years with an automatic renewal clause which extends your contract for an additional year at a time, unless you close your account properly.

I do recommend, as always, that you review your contract terms before signing on the dotted line. Make sure to follow instructions to a “T” to avoid issues with account closing.

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My Impressions

If you’re looking for a credit card processor that offers a full-service merchant account, and you’re a small- to mid-sized business, CDGcommerce is one of the best and affordable options for you. As your monthly processing volume increases, you could qualify for lower interchange-plus processing rates. CDG doesn’t charge gateway fees, PCI compliance fees or monthly minimums, so account maintenance fees will always be low and predictable.

What’s more, equipment is provided for “free” or for an extremely low monthly fee. Keep in mind, however, you’ll have to return your terminal if you cancel your account.

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