When consumers come across references to payment gateways, they often wonder why they are needed. And some business owners who already use payment gateway services are perplexed by the situation. What is a payment gateway, and why is it important for businesses that want to offer their customers a secure method of online credit card processing?

Simply put, a payment gateway is a service provider that authorizes payments. Online businesses/retailers as well as brick and mortar stores use this e-commerce platform service provider. Consumers remember the payment gateway as the point of sale terminal while shopping with a credit card in certain retail outlets.

The payment gateway’s job is to keep credit card and financial details secure. It is responsible for encrypting all personal details relevant to the transaction being handled (including the credit card number of the customer). Businesses should assume all information relevant to the transaction at hand to be transferred safely from the customer to the merchant and from the merchant to the payment processor if they use a reliable payment gateway provider (like First Data Global Gateway Secure Payment Gateway).

Businesses who choose to process credit card transaction manually lose several benefits provided when working with a payment gateway service:

• Fraud protection: Payment gateways notify merchants immediately if a consumer presents a credit card that has been reported as lost or stolen; preventing the transaction before it is processed. This prevents charge-backs for merchants and protects customers from fraudulent charges.
• Speed and efficiency: Merchants that conduct a large number of credit card transactions will find that working with a payment gateway significantly decreases the amount spent on transaction processing, and since time is money, most businesses find the relationship to be a profitable one.
• Less red tape: Businesses just starting out will discover that with a payment gateway the company can start accepting credit cards immediately; without the service the merchant account needs to show a positive credit history.

Do I Need a Payment Gateway?

If you run a purely eCommerce platform, — specifically, one that accepts payments online, the response is a resounding yes. Without a payment gateway, there is no way to accept credit cards over the internet.

Keep in mind that because the transaction is made by a payment gateway, it is treated as a “card-not-present” transaction. This suggests that the retailer is dependent solely on the credit card details provided by the client. The customer’s credit card is not visible to the merchant.

There is no way to read data from the card’s magstripe or EMV chip during a card-not-present transaction. As a consequence, there’s a chance that there will be more cases of theft. As a result.

Global Payment Data & Statistics

About 1 Billion people are predicted use a mobile payment app worldwide in 2020 It is forecast that by 2023 this will grow to 1.31 billion people worldwide using mobile payments apps over a 6 month period.

It’s predicted 36.6% of smartphone users to make an in-store mobile payment in 2019 the vast majority of mobile payment users are in Asia-Pacific (mainly China) but proximity mobile payments are also popular among smartphone users in India, Denmark, Sweden and South Korea.

$3.08 Trillion forecasted global mobile payment market size by 2024 this is a huge increase from the $1.15 Trillion in 2019 and is a compound annual growth rate of 23.2% during the forecast period (2019-2024).

Alipay Is Now the World’s Biggest Mobile Payment Platform With 1.2bn+ Users with China’s huge population driving its mobile payments industry, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the global market is dominated by Chinese tech firms. Alipay is the world’s biggest mobile payment platform with more than 1.2 billion daily active users, overtaking previous leader WeChat Pay Either way, these two Chinese mobile payment solutions overshadow every other provider across the globe in terms of pure user numbers.

COMPANY	ACTIVE USERS	LATEST FIGURES FROM
Alipay	1.2 billion+	Alipay (Q3 2019)
WeChat	1.151 billion	Tencent (Q3 2019)
Apple Pay	441 million	Loup Ventures (Q3 2019)
PayPal	305 million	PayPal (Q4 2019)
Samsung Pay	51 million	Juniper (2018)
Amazon Pay	50 million	Evercore ISI, Investopedia (May 2018)
Google Pay	39 million	Juniper (2018)

The growth and future of e-commerce in the Middle East

Perhaps the most significant of all recent developments in retail is the growth and progress of e-commerce. According to a joint study by Dubai Economy and Visa, the UAE is currently the most advanced e-commerce market in the Middle East and North Africa, revealing an estimated annual growth of 23% between 2018 and 2022. While customers continue to enjoy the ‘destination shopping’ aspect of visiting a physical store, COVID-19 has encouraged many people to try e-commerce for the first time. This jump in online users is not expected to reduce.

A recent study of ten markets in the region, including the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, revealed that up to 40% of respondents are now shopping online more than they were before the novel coronavirus outbreak.

Research commissioned by the global consultancy firm Kearney Middle East asked consumers if they would maintain their current shopping behaviors after the pandemic: 48% in the UAE and 69% in Saudi Arabia answered ‘yes’. This behavior usually translates to shopping that is less frequent and more planned, with bigger online grocery purchases.

Moreover, the World Economic Forum has estimated the UAE’s 2020 e-commerce market at $27.2bn, with similar growth across MENA.

Popular Available E-Commerce Payment Gateways for UAE:

• Telr (www.telr.com)     
  • Undoubtedly, Telr is one of the most well-known payment gateways in UAE, which can provide multiple popular payment methods.
  • Now, it supports more than 100 countries, and constantly updates more payment methods.
  • There are three payment levels: Entry, Small and Medium, which are great for startups, SMEs and e-commerce businesses in the emerging market.
  • Popular Payment Gateways for Dubai UAE.

• Amazon Payment Services (https://paymentservices.amazon.com)
  • The second prevalent online UAE payment gateway that we want to suggest is Amazon Payment Services (previously known as PayFort). This is an Amazon Company, operating in Arabic speaking and surrounding countries such as UAE, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Jordan, and Qatar.
  • Amazon’s excellent payment gateway accepts and proceeds multiple online payment methods with high security in order to minimize transaction risks in your site and boost your revenue.
  • Since this payment gateway is tailored to Arab online buying habits and trends, it would be a perfect payment solution for your e-commerce store

• Checkout (www.checkout.com)
  • Founded in 2012, Checkout is a leading international ecommerce gateway provider of online payment solutions.
  • In 2014, Checkout provides services to UAE and it offers a streamlined solution for mobile and online purchasing.
  • For UAE and other countries in the Middle East, Checkout offers 5 payment methods namely VISA, MasterCard, JCB, Mada, and American Express.

• 2checkout (www.2checkout.com)
  • 2checkout is an entirely different company with “Checkout”.
  • Founded in 2006, this is an international payment gateway that develops trading services including credit cards and debit cards.
  • In UAE, 2checkout provides 10 payment methods including American Express, Apple Pay, Bank Transfer, JCB, MasterCard, Neteller, PayPal, PO, Skrill, and VISA.
  • This convenient e-commerce payment gateway has spread its reputation on 200 countries up to now.

• CC Avenue (www.ccavenue.com)
  • Launched in 2001, CC Avenue is known as the largest Indian payment gateway provider. 3 years later, this company decided to expand its global footprint with the new office in Dubai.
  • Today, it has become a specialist in the field of electronic payments and is widely used by the UAE ecommerce businesses.
  • CC Avenue payment gateway pricing can suit all of the business levels, from small and medium enterprises to large corporations in the e-commerce market.

• PayTabs (site.paytabs.com/en/)   
  • The last online payment gateway in UAE that we highly recommend is PayTabs (established in 2014), which is well-known for leading-edge payment processing and fraud prevention system.
  • This flexible and secure online payment solution enables e-businesses to make or receive payments online with ease, create and send invoices through agile and unique technology.
  • Moreover, PayTabs’s innovative layers of security management are certified by both Visa and MasterCard.

• CyberSource (www.cybersource.com/en.html)
  • CyberSource is a part of well-known international firm VISA.
  • They operate in more than 190 countries around the globe and offer multiple solutions.
  • CS also supports digital payment methods such as Apple Pay and Android Pay, as well as regional digital wallets such as Alipay, and KCP.

Summary

Payment Gateway	Website URL	Pricing URL	Service Location	API Support Web	API Support Mobile
Telr	www.telr.com	https://telr.com/pricing/	120+	Y	Y
Amazon	https://paymentservices.amazon.com/	https://paymentservices.amazon.com/pricing	8	Y	Y
Checkout	www.checkout.com	https://www.checkout.com/pricing	150+	Y	Y
2Checkout	www.2checkout.com	https://www.2checkout.com/pricing/	200+	Y	Y
CC Avenue	www.ccavenue.com	https://login.ccavenue.ae/web/registration.do?command=navigateSchemeForm	9	Y	Y
PayTabs	site.paytabs.com/en/	https://site.paytabs.com/en/pricing/	160+	Y	Y
CyberSource	www.cybersource.com/en.html	https://www.cybersource.com/en/contact-us/sales.html	190+	Y	Y