Credit Card PRocessing for Gun Parts and Accessories

[CardFellow]

So I have been shut down by Stripe.com for selling parts and accessories on my web site by Stripe.com and Authorize.net.

Not selling guns or any federally regulated parts... just other parts and accessories.

Does anyone know of a company that does not discriminate based on this?

Authorize.net said they are setting me up with a secondary company so I will still be through authorize.net. But I don't want to give them the opportunity.

I'm a little late to the party, but have experience helping gun shops (and accessory dealers, etc.) get the service they need. When people talk about discrimination surrounding lawful guns, they rarely talk about this one: Everything related to gun sales is considered "high risk" in credit card processing. That category usually deals more with the types of businesses that are likely to get a lot of chargebacks or otherwise have more risk for the processor. There's not a lot of good reason that gun dealers should be on it. But they are, so for the time being, you'll have to work within that.

Any of the aggregators (Stripe, PayPal, Square, etc.) aren't going to allow gun sales. They don't allow anything high risk.
The next issue is that high risk processing usually has a higher fee than non high-risk businesses. So it's a matter of finding both a processor that will take on a "high risk" business and still give competitive pricing.

I'd be happy to give specific advice on doing that yourself, or you're welcome to check out my company's web app for comparing processors. We work with several companies (like TSYS, one of the largest processors in the world, and smaller companies like Payline, if you prefer a more boutique company feel) that explicitly support gun and accessory sales, and offer competitive pricing.

As for Authorize.Net, it's your call on continuing to work with them or not, but keep in mind that it's not really their fault that Stripe closed your account. Authorize.Net is basically the "credit card machine" of the internet in that situation - that is, how your customers "run" their cards. Stripe was functioning as the processing company, and Authorize.Net was functioning as the equipment to take cards. They're one of the most popular gateway companies, so depending on who else you go with for processing, you may have to continue working with them. (Some processing companies offer their own gateway, but others just set things up through Authorize.)

Anyway, like I said, it doesn't quite sit right with us that gun dealers face these kind of hurdles, so I'm happy to answer any questions you have. Just give me a shout!