Payment Gateways are digital platforms that help flourish electronic payments, particularly for e-commerce. For anyone considering to startup online business, the cost of transaction is one of the most important factors to workout. To help ecommerce players in Pakistan understand the online payment gateway providers, in this post we have done thorough review along with the charges to setup, recurring fees, merchant account opening procedure and integration process.
E-commerce industry is in early stages in Pakistan however one important piece that has been missing for a long while to support the growth and ecosystem is enabling consumers to make purchase online using credit/debit card. Though international payment gateway were used by certain eCommerce websites to provide this facility however the procedure and cost of setting up and ongoing recurring fees was not only high but passed on to the consumers which made online shopping an expensive proposition. This delay in bringing localized e-payments offering by financial institutions forced online businesses to look for alternate options such as cash on delivery, which in the beginning was a logistical challenge but this soon gave birth to various specialized startups that offers outsourced cash pick up and delivery service at a reasonable fees. This soon became a norm for both e-commerce stores and consumers and now adopted by upcoming online businesses.
Realizing the need, UBL in 2013 launched a local payment gateway service in collaboration with Etisalat which was the only option for quite sometime but not a very lucrative one.
Only recently other financial institutions including HBL, MCB and EasyPaisa (Telenor & Tameer bank intiative) has also launched payment gateway offering competitive rates and better options.
The technology behind these 4 providers vary as most of them use international payment schemes, MCB utilizes the hosted services offered by MasterCard’s MIGs to allow ‘card not present’ transaction. HBL, the largest bank in Pakistan, has partnered with VISA using their hosted payment application Cybersource while EasyPaisa has launched EasyPay, a local payment gateway application developed by Systems limited. Lastly, UBL used Etisalat proprietary solution to offer ecommerce based transaction. Before we get into the pricing structure, we have explained the meaning of different terms used by banks and what it means to you.
Merchant Account: Merchant here refers to the business that wishes to accept payment online. A business account must be opened in the same bank they wish to use the payment gateway. Every bank requires different set of documents to open a business account of your company however at minimum, you will be required to produce NTN, AOP and CNIC of owners.
Merchant Discount Rate (MDR): This is a percentage charged by the bank (payment gateway provider) to merchant on each transaction. For example, if you have signed up with a bank that offers 1% MDR and a customer makes a payment of Rs. 1000 on your website, Rs. 10 will be dedcuted by bank and Rs. 990 will be deposited in your merchant account.
Settlement Period: It is a time from the moment when a transaction is authorized by the payment gateway provider to the time when money shows up in your business(merchant) bank account. The reason for the delay is because banks want to decrease the number of chargebacks and fraudulent transactions. By holding on to the money for a few days, or in some cases weeks, they are ensuring that all is in order before the seller is paid.
Now that you understand the jargons and well versed with them, now look at the pricing structure of each Payment Gateway.
[table id=2 /]
Except Easypay, FED (16.5%) will be charged additional on top of the above fees . Chart prepared by Smartchoice.pk
Integration
An API is provided by payment gateway provider which needs to be integrated into your ecommerce website, this can be easily done by a web developer.
Below table will further help you understand the strengthens and weakness of each payment gateway
Bank |
Points to consider |
 |
Benefits Quick to setup Multiple payment options Quick settlement FED charges included in pricing |
 |
Benefits Proven and renowned payment gateway Monitor and Protects from fraudulent transaction Low MDR Used by Aga Khan, DHA, Nadra Disadvantage Longer settlement period Ecommerce store must be in business for 2 years Longer account opening procedure |
![MCB_logo[1]](https://smartchoice.pk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/MCB_logo1.jpg){kind=logo} |
Benefits Proven and renowned payment gateway Monitor and Protects from fraudulent transaction Disadvantage Higher MDR Yet to be used by known ecommerce store |
![23338-UBLDASKA,Sialkotubl-daska-sialkot-pkmart[1]](https://smartchoice.pk/blog/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/23338-UBLDASKASialkotubl-daska-sialkot-pkmart1.jpg) |
Benefits No transaction fee Shorter settlement period Disadvantage Higher MDR Longer account opening proces |
Verdict
When it comes to technology HBL and MCB uses robust application and you can be assured that you are in safe hands, no ecommerce store wants to be victim to fraudsters.
For early stage startups or purely e-commerce companies, Easypay is a great option since it utilizes local payment system, no upfront payment and has rapid settlement period. It is easy to implement as well, making it ideal for e-commerce and small scale businesses.
For larger corporations, HBL seems to be the best choice. The MDR is lower as well as the annual fee, and has a respectable corporation like Agha Khan as its client.
For payment gateway providers, it is going to be a long way to generate real volume and share a substantial percentage of online transactions as it requires a behavioural change to migrate customers from cash on delivery mechanism to pay online. Online businesses also need to play their part to encourage customers by not passing on the MDR to customer and offering other lucrative offers.
If you are you using any of these platforms to accept payment online, tell us about your experience in comments section below.
This is very informative article. It would have been great if MDRs of all four banks were also mentioned. One more thing, it’s mentioned in UBL’s benefits that there is no Transaction Fees. Do other banks charge transaction fee other than MDR???
MDR is mentioned in the post, please see the first table/chart given. As per our information, only MCB charges Rs. 15 as transaction fees above their MDR
Thanks for your response.
Want to contact u, how …..
Does easypaisa work with international cards as well?
as of today YES :), EasyPay: Any local or international Visa/Mastercard Credit or Debit Card holder can pay online
They accept International client as their customer? (Like customer from other country) for accepting payment from PK.
We can offer this service to you.
Easypay now accepts visa and master card. Please update your article
Is there any minimum transaction amount limit for any of them?
can we integrate local bank api,s for android apps? 🙂 😀
IN THE UBL Paymentgatway no limit of payment , they are using leading compaines of pakistan
I want to use an credit card option in wordpress, so any recommendation for best extension for this?
I left a productive comment on this crapy article but you deleted it. How do you plan to develop credibility for this blog if you put up lies to build public consent ? Should i report your blog on pro-pakistani ?
is there any person who integrate HBL Internet Payment gateway on WooCommerce please reply me or Call me at 03112000981.. Please need reply urgently…
Does MCB allows payment gateway integration into Mobile Applications?
Can you provide me a list of websites which are using MCB Gateway?
My choice is easy pay the perfect way for transaction
Is there a ‘PERSONAL’ merchant account?
For individual consultants that don’t run companies?
HBL ALERT:
I applied for hbl payment gateway in Nov 2017. Completed all documents in 2 days. Got response from them in January for integration. I stated integration all by myself. Their integration team is very lazy and they won’t help you at all with integration. Anyhow I completed the integration all by myself. They asked me to perform test transactions which I did and in March 20, 2018, they told me that my account is almost ready all i have to do is perform live test transactions. I performed test transactions and after waiting for many days i got email reply from HBL that my application for payment gateway has been declined by their Risk department. I waited for frustrating 5 months just to hear that my application is rejected. So my advice to all who are going to apply to HBL for payment gateway is “STAY AWAY FROM THEM”. HBL is one of the most pathetic lazy bank in Pakistan. Imagine the pain and financial loss that I have got during last 5 months just to hear that my application is rejected. They took 5 months to reject my application. Now I am applying to MCB , lets see how things turn out. Will update everyone about that.
And how this went with MCB ?
Its true HBL has very bad service for this at least i mail at ipg@hbl.com next day a person send me email whos name is meraj n tell me to set meeting after office in local mall i said ok but from that day he will not even pick my call or doesn’t give me any reply from msgs
I don’t expect that type of service from HBL
Sad to see that Pakistan don’t have enough Payment gateway. Here in India we have 30+ popular Payment gateway.
Why you guys not start new online payment gateway by contacting bank and start your gateway or use Bitcoin to run your gateway. Its not so hard and does not require too much more. Only Rs.20000 is enough for starting your gateway.