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6 Best Credit Repair Merchant Accounts

These reputable payment services providers offer merchant accounts with reasonable rates to high-risk industries.

    Chris Motola
  • Last updated onUpdated

  • Shannon Vissers
  • REVIEWED BY

    Shannon Vissers

    Lead Staff Writer

Our content reflects the editorial opinions of our experts. While our site makes money through referral partnerships, we only partner with companies that meet our standards for quality, as outlined in our independent rating and scoring system.

If you’ve visited our business loans section, you know that credit scores still play a huge role in a merchant’s ability to get funding.

Business owners with poor credit may find themselves locked out of some of the better sources of funding. And more people than ever are relying on their credit in the midst of a rising trend in fraud and identity theft.

Maybe you’ve decided to make helping business owners repair their credit your business. More specifically, you may want to help people who’ve experienced glitches in their aid, assistance, or forbearance systems and, consequently, have been unable to report their late payments to their credit bureau, dinging their credit.

So, now you’re looking for a merchant account for credit repair companies. However, getting a credit repair merchant account can, itself, be a bit of a challenge. You’ll probably need to look into the best high-risk merchant accounts.

Learn More About Our Top Picks

CompanyHighlightsNext StepsHighlights
Corepay

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  • Fast approval times
  • MOTO accounts available
  • Wide variety of payment gateway options
  • Fast approval times
  • MOTO accounts available
  • Wide variety of payment gateway options

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Host Merchant Services

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  • Free terminal available
  • Interchange-plus pricing available
  • Excellent customer service
  • Free terminal available
  • Interchange-plus pricing available
  • Excellent customer service

Visit Site

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Durango Merchant Services

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  • Proprietary gateway
  • No early termination fee for most customers
  • Cryptocurrency processing available
  • Proprietary gateway
  • No early termination fee for most customers
  • Cryptocurrency processing available

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Soar Payments

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  • No cost to apply or setup account
  • Two-year contracts
  • Excellent customer support
  • No cost to apply or setup account
  • Two-year contracts
  • Excellent customer support

Visit Site

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Easy Pay Direct

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  • Strong feature set
  • No early termination fee
  • Excellent customer service
  • Strong feature set
  • No early termination fee
  • Excellent customer service

Visit Site

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Instabill

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  • Wide range of terminals & POS systems
  • Works with ultra high-risk businesses
  • Anonymous payments available
  • Wide range of terminals & POS systems
  • Works with ultra high-risk businesses
  • Anonymous payments available

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Read more below to learn why we chose these options.

Table of Contents

Why Do You Need A High-Risk Merchant Account For Credit Repair Businesses?

Customers with poor credit, at face value and in the eyes of banks, are risky customers who have recently had trouble paying their debts on time. As a credit repair business, those same customers are your clients, a fact that makes your credit repair industry a high-risk one.

Banks, conservative lenders that they are, view the credit repair industry as one prone to chargebacks and fraud — your business likely provides high-ticket services as well as services on recurring billing plans, factors that make your business particularly susceptible to chargeback risks.

All this to say that, for credit repair companies, this means that popular third-party processors like Square, PayPal, and Stripe are out, as are many of the best small credit card processing companies. Instead, you’ll have to look at high-risk merchant service providers to get your credit repair merchant account.

Should You Get An Offshore Merchant Account For Credit Repair?

Offshore merchant accounts can offer a way to do an end-run around the restrictions of domestic merchant account providers. This strategy works, but it can be expensive–even more so than working with a domestic high-risk merchant account provider. Offshore merchant account providers understand that if a business is trying to circumvent domestic account provider restrictions, they’re likely willing to pay a little extra along the way. Additionally, you may have a hard time resolving any legal disputes that arise if you decide to use an offshore merchant account in lieu of a domestic one.

One limiting factor for credit repair companies is that credit scores are a distinctly American phenomenon. You probably won’t have much of an international market for your services, which limits the amount of advantage you can reap from an offshore account.

The 6 Best Credit Repair Merchant Accounts

The best credit repair merchant accounts are able to accommodate high-risk transactions at a fair price with reasonable contract terms. While you may not be able to access the lowest payment processing rates, you should still expect quality service.

The Best Merchant Accounts For Credit Repair Companies Compared

Account Setup Fees Account Approval Time Payment Gateways
Corepay 24-72 hours NetValve, Authorize.Net
Host Merchant Services Not advertised Transaction Central, HMSExpress, Authorize.Net
Durango Merchant Services 24 hours – 6 business days Durango Pay
Soar Payments 3-5 business days Authorize.Net, NMI, USAePay
Instabill Not advertised Instabill payment gateway
Easy Pay Direct $99 Not advertised EPD gateway, Authorize.Net, NMI

Corepay: Best For Variety Of Payment Options

Total Rating 4.0
Fees & Rates4.3

Products & Services5.0

Contract2.4

Sales & Advertising Transparency3.9

Customer Service4.3

User Reviews3.0



Pros

  • Fast approval times
  • ACH processing available
  • Mail-order support

Cons

  • Limited public contract disclosure
  • Long-term contract usually required

Why Corepay Is The Best Choice If You Need A Variety Of Payment Options

Corepay's fast approval process can be a great benefit to any high-risk merchant, including those running credit repair companies.

Corepay is geared primarily towards eCommerce with a diverse selection of payment gateways and offshore account options, which should be more than adequate for a typical credit repair company.

Corepay Features

Corepay features include:

  • High-risk & low-risk merchant accounts
  • eCommerce specialists
  • MOTO (Mail Order/Telephone Order) only accounts also available
  • 24-48 hour account approval timeframe
  • Offers NetValve proprietary payment gateway. Also integrates with Authorize.Net, NMI, Inovio, etc.
  • Offers CB-ALERT anti-fraud software
  • ACH processing available

Corepay Pricing

  • No application or account setup fees
  • No annual fees
  • Variable monthly fees
  • Variable processing rates (starting at 2.95% for high-risk merchants)

Get Started With Corepay

Read our in-depth review

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Host Merchant Services: Best For eCommerce

Host Merchant Services

Total Rating 4.9
Fees & Rates5.0

Products & Services5.0

Contract5.0

Sales & Advertising Transparency4.7

Customer Service4.6

User Reviews4.8



Pros

  • Excellent customer service
  • In-service financing available
  • Paper check processing support

Cons

  • Opaque tiered pricing
  • Undisclosed terms
  • Limited features

Why Host Merchant Services Is the Best Option For Credit Repair Companies That Bill Online

Host Merchant Services is among our list of best credit card processing companies for small businesses. While they don't offer quite as great terms to high-risk customers like credit repair companies, you can still expect competitive pricing and terms from Host Merchant Services.

Host Merchant Services also offers a variety of third-party products and services, and has a remarkably low complaint volume from its users, as well as the same high level of customer support that low-risk businesses receive.

Host Merchant Services Features

Key products and services for Host Merchant Services include the following:

  • High-risk merchant accounts
  • “Free” EMV-compatible terminal available
  • Wide selection of POS systems
  • Choice of Transaction Express or Authorize.Net payment gateways
  • $100,000 data breach insurance with all accounts

Host Merchant Services Pricing

  • No application or setup fees
  • Variable account fees per customized quote
  • Variable processing rates per customized quote
  • $5-$10/month gateway fee
  • $15 chargeback fee
  • No PCI compliance fee

Get Started With Host Merchant Services

Read our in-depth review

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Durango Merchant Services: Best For Blacklisted Merchants

Durango Merchant Services

Total Rating 4.8
Fees & Rates4.5

Products & Services5.0

Contract5.0

Sales & Advertising Transparency4.9

Customer Service4.4

User Reviews5.0



Pros

  • Fair pricing and excellent contract terms
  • No early termination fee in most cases
  • International merchant accounts available

Cons

  • No pricing disclosures
  • Long-term contracts usually required

Why Durango Merchant Services Is Best For Blacklisted Merchants

Durango Merchant Services has just about everything you'd want to see in a high-risk payment processor, most notably reserving early termination fees for only the riskiest clients.

Durango Merchant Services can cover a variety of uses, including in-person, eCommerce, and mobile payments. Businesses looking to save money on credit card processing fees can take advantage of Durango Merchant Service's eCheck or cryptocurrency processing capabilities.

Notably, Durango Merchant Services specializes in finding merchant accounts for business owners with poor credit or have landed on a credit card processing blacklist like the Terminated Merchant File (TMF) or MATCH list.

Durango Merchant Services Features

Durango Merchant Services features include:

  • High-risk merchant accounts
  • Durango Pay payment gateway
  • eCheck payment processing
  • Cryptocurrency processing

Durango Merchant Services Pricing

  • Highly variable processing rates
  • Highly variable account fees
  • A long-term contract and an early termination fee may apply

Get Started With Durango Merchant Services

Read our in-depth review

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Soar Payments: Best For Faster Approval

Total Rating 3.9
Fees & Rates3.8

Products & Services3.9

Contract3.3

Sales & Advertising Transparency4.7

Customer Service4.4

User Reviews4.0



Pros

  • Automated custom price quoting
  • Easy application process
  • Fast underwriting

Cons

  • Only available to U.S. customers
  • Opaque tiered pricing
  • High early termination fee initially

Why Soar Payments Is The Best Choice For Credit Repair Companies That Need Fast Approval

Being a high-risk business doesn't mean you have to settle for second-rate service. If you're looking for a fully functional suite of payment processing features, you should consider Soar Payments.

Soar Payments offers eCommerce integrations, a payment gateway through Authorize.Net, ACH processing, and POS hardware--which covers just about all your bases. Additionally, it offers chargeback management and fraud prevention, which will help cut down on fraudulent chargebacks and other suspicious activity. It also has substantial experience in placing credit repair companies with backend processors.

Perhaps most importantly, Soar Payments has some of the most lenient contract terms you'll see in the high-risk processing segment.

Soar Payments Features

Soar Payments features include:

  • POS and eCommerce ready
  • Mobile processing solution available
  • Virtual terminal included
  • Authorize.Net, NMI Gateway or USAePay payment gateways are available
  • ACH and echeck processing are available
  • Chargeback management and fraud prevention

Soar Payments Pricing

  • Variable processing rates for high-risk accounts (tiered pricing usually used)
  • Variable account fees for high-risk merchants
  • Usually includes a monthly minimum
  • A long-term contract and an early termination fee may apply

Get Started With Soar Payments

Read our in-depth review

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Easy Pay Direct: Best For Load Balancing Feature

Easy Pay Direct

Total Rating 4.1
Fees & Rates4.0

Products & Services4.5

Contract3.7

Sales & Advertising Transparency3.9

Customer Service4.1

User Reviews4.0



Pros

  • Load balancing feature may be helpful for some high-risk businesses
  • No early termination fee
  • Good proprietary gateway

Cons

  • Setup fee
  • Load balancing comes with additional monthly fee

Why Easy Pay Direct Is The Best Choice For Companies That Hit Monthly Processing Limits

High-risk accounts often come with monthly processing limits that can be a hassle for high-risk merchants. Easy Pay Direct offers load balancing, which allows you to strategically spread your transactions across multiple accounts as needed. This does come at the cost of having multiple accounts each with their own monthly fee, but the convenience may be worth it for companies that regularly run into these problems.

Additionally, Easy Pay Direct doesn't have early termination fees. It comes at the cost of a $99 setup fee, but that's a fairly trivial cost compared to most early termination fees.

Easy Pay Direct Features

Easy Pay Direct specializes in eCommerce, but can also support retail businesses. Features include:

  • High-risk merchant accounts
  • Load-balancing feature available
  • Proprietary Easy Pay Direct (EPD) Gateway
  • Virtual terminal available with EPD Gateway
  • Countertop credit card terminals are available
  • Proprietary QuickClick shopping cart (plus support for 250+ third-party carts)
  • APIs and SDKs available for site customization

Easy Pay Direct Pricing

  • $99 account setup fee
  • $24.95 monthly account maintenance fee
  • Variable processing rates (tiered and interchange-plus pricing used)
  • Variable additional monthly and annual fees
  • A long-term contract may apply
  • No early termination fee (except for offshore accounts)

Get Started With Easy Pay Direct

Read our in-depth review

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Instabill: Best For Very High Risk Businesses

Total Rating 3.8
Fees & Rates3.8

Products & Services4.6

Contract2.2

Sales & Advertising Transparency4.2

Customer Service4.0

User Reviews4.0



Pros

  • Will work with almost any industry
  • Good customer service
  • International merchant accounts available

Cons

  • Fees may vary greatly
  • Usually requires a rolling reserve

Why Instabill Is The Best Choice For Very High-Risk Businesses

Instabill is a service that specializes in overseas merchant accounts. If your business proves too risky even for most domestic high-risk payment processors, Instabill appears to be able to work with even the riskiest businesses (online gambling sites, for example). The feature suite isn't the most complete, but you can get ACH processing and mobile EMV POS through integrations or Instabill's partners. Credit card terminals are available through lease, which we generally recommend against.

Since Instabill is partnered with a number of banks throughout the world, there's not much information available upfront about pricing. A big point in Instabill's favor, however, is that there really aren't that many customer complaints out there about them. Expect higher prices but also competent customer service and complaint resolution.

Instabill Features

Instabill features include:

  • High-risk domestic merchant accounts
  • Offshore accounts
  • Proprietary payment gateway
  • Hosted payment page available
  • Wide range of third-party terminals & POS systems
  • Mobile processing solution available

Instabill Pricing

  • Variable processing rates for high-risk accounts (tiered pricing usually used)
  • Variable account fees for high-risk merchants
  • Usually includes a monthly minimum
  • A long-term contract and an early termination fee may apply

Get Started With Instabill

Read our in-depth review

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Payment Processing Rating Methodology

Merchant Maverick has been researching the payment processing industry since 2009. Our writers have reviewed hundreds of credit card processors, merchant account services, and mobile payment apps, evaluating each provider carefully on several different metrics.

Weighted Rating Breakdown

Fees & Rates 25%
Products & Services 25%
Contract 20%
Sales & Advertising Transparency 15%
Customer Service 10%
User Reviews 5%

When comparing different payment processing companies and applications to one another, we consider numerous data points. Our experts start by comparing credit card processing rates, the presence of additional fees, contract length, sales practices, and the presence or absence of additional features and services, like point of sale software. Each provider is judged on its own merits and how well it stacks up to industry standards; then it is weighed against the other providers on the list.

We spend an average of 10-15 hours researching and updating each one of our lists, making sure every company or application included meets our internal standards for quality and reputation. Any list of recommended payment processors on our site might contain a mix of standard merchant accounts, third-party payment processors, mobile payment devices, and high-risk payment processors, depending on what our expert feels is the best fit for certain scenarios or business types.

For additional details about Merchant Maverick’s review and rating processes, please refer to any or all of the following methodology pages:

15

Years reviewing payment processors

100+

Providers evaluated

25

Attributes and features assessed per vendor

40+

Years combined experience


5 Ways To Improve Your Chances Of Getting A High-Risk Merchant Account For Credit Repair

There’s no magic formula that guarantees approval, but there are some things you can do to increase your chances of being approved for a credit repair merchant account.

Have A Solid Business Plan

One thing you can do to ease the concerns of merchant services providers is to have a solid credit repair business plan. Demonstrate that you know what you’re doing, where your profits will come from, and the risks inherent to your business. In other words, make it look like the clients you do attract will be paying their bills regularly with little chance of chargebacks.

Be As Transparent As Possible

It’s important that you’re as upfront as possible about the nature of your business to increase the likelihood of being approved for a credit repair merchant account. Complete transparency should include your business’s history of accepting credit card and online transactions as well as any potential chargebacks that are associated with the services you provide.

Have Good Credit

You may not have a lot of control over your industry’s reputation or those of your customers, but one thing you can directly impact is your own credit rating. As is the case with most things financial in the U.S., having a good credit rating will make it easier to get services. And, if your business is credit repair, shouldn’t you have figured out how to repair your own?

Explain Previous Chargebacks

Transparency goes a long way for high-risk merchants; explanations of previous chargebacks can drastically improve that transparency. Increase your chances of getting approved for a credit repair merchant account by furnishing the complete history of chargebacks you’ve dealt with.

Have Documentation Ready

Your application process will go a lot more smoothly if you have the documents your service provider will request handy ahead of time. Typically this means valid personal identification, three months of bank statements, and three months of credit card processing statements (if any). Note that overseas merchant accounts will likely need additional information, so check with the merchant services provider you’re applying to in advance to make sure you’ve got everything you need.

How Do I Choose The Best Credit Repair Merchant Account For My Business?

Being in a high-risk industry like credit repair may narrow your merchant account options, but that doesn’t mean you have to settle for just anything short of the best high-risk merchant services. Even among high-risk merchant accounts, there are good, reputable providers as well as sharks looking to take advantage of desperate businesses. With tiered pricing, the service that appears to offer the cheapest merchant account for credit repair business may not really provide the most value for your money — or even the cheapest rate, for that matter, as only certain transactions will be processed at the advertised low rate.

Need more resources to help you set up your credit repair business? We can help you get a high-risk business loan.

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Chris Motola

Chris Motola

Expert Contributor at Merchant Maverick
Chris has been writing about small business topics since 2003. He has been featured in Fox Business, ABC News, Yahoo Finance, GoBankingRates, Newsweek, BizJournals, and other publications. He has a Bachelor’s of Arts in English Writing Arts from SUNY Oswego, and a Masters of Science in Interactive Media from the University of Central Florida. He currently resides in the Hudson Valley region of New York.
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