Accepting credit cards as a form of payment requires a department to accept the economic, compliance and administrative responsibilities of handling them.
A good place to start collecting information on those requirements is Policy 330-35. The policy provides insight into the types of merchants and the process to request authorization to become a merchant.
Merchant Responsibilities
| Economic | Card brands charge discount fees approximately 2.5% to 2.75% of the transaction volume. Refer to Interchange Rate Schedule for full details. Additionally, Finance charges a credit card subscription cost assessed each fiscal year. The rates are summarized below: E-commerce/Card-not-present Environments - $2,650/YR Physical Credit Card Device/ Card-present or Mail Order/Telephone Order (MOTO) Environment - $885/YR |
| Compliance | The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards (PCI DSS) are technical and operational requirements set by the PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) to protect cardholder data. Compliance with the PCI DSS is enforced by the payment card brands. The standards apply to all organizations that store, process, transmit, or impact cardholder data. If you are a merchant that accepts credit cards, you are required to be compliant with PCI DSS and all applicable requirements. To validate compliance, merchants are required to annually complete a self-assessment questionnaire (SAQ) and work with Merchant Support to address any findings or gaps identified during the attestation period. Additionally, your merchant environment will be required to participate in an annual audit for the review of merchant credit card handling processes, reviewing required policies and physical inspection of system/devices that process credit cards. |
| Training | Online credit card training is required to be completed annually by all relevant staff involved in credit card acceptance or processing. To access the training, go to LMS, and enter Credit Card Handling in the Search field and the training will be available for viewing. The training takes approximately 20 minutes. |
| Policies and Procedures | All merchants are required to have detailed departmental policies and procedures including the handling of credit cards. |