PayJunction Review

Pros

• Transparent cost-plus pricing
• Month-to-month agreement
• Few public complaints
• Free gateway
• eCheck processing offered
• PCI-compliant solution
• Volume discounts available for established businesses

Cons

• A monthly fee for lower-volume merchants
• Not global-friendly
• Not suitable for high-risk industries

What Is PayJunction?

PayJunction is a true modern payment processor in that it offers much more than just merchant accounts. The company’s payments platform helps merchants organize their sales data, mitigate risk, reduce paper-based inefficiencies, and expand customer payment options. Combine this with PayJunction’s competitive rate matching and reputation for superb customer service, and you get one of the best credit card processors out there.

The service suite hinges on the PayJunction payment gateway, which also serves as a basic point of sale for card-present and card-not-present transactions, including credit, debit, and ACH (check) payments. Plus, PayJunction’s paperless system logs all of your transactions, so you can wave goodbye to those anachronistic receipt bundles!

Products & Services

PayJunction earns a strong score in this section for its wide variety of hardware and software tools for merchants of all kinds. The only thing weighing down PJ’s score a bit here is the lack of pricing disclosures from the company regarding its terminal devices.

PayJunction is focused on electronic payments and offers a robust set of developer tools. Offering Smart Terminals, recurring billing, and remote signature tools, PayJunction is a great choice for online businesses and anyone else accepting payments in non-traditional settings. It certainly isn’t bad for traditional retailers, but it offers a particularly nice set of services to tech-driven businesses.

Let’s delve into what PayJunction has to offer.

Smart Terminals

Screen Capture – PayJunction.com – ZeroTouch Terminal – 2023

PayJunction now offers two modern payment terminals — one for the countertop and one for mobile payments. The former option, the ZeroTouch Terminal, is a customer-facing, contactless terminal designed to be easy to use and clean. No signatures are required, and all receipts are digital-only. Your customers can swipe, dip the EMV chip, or tap to make NFC contactless payments, including Google Pay and Apple Pay. This PayJunction terminal may be free to businesses that process more than $25K/month with valid documentation.

Screen Capture – PayJunction.com – Portable Terminal – 2023

PayJunction’s mobile reader, the handheld Portable Terminal, does everything the ZeroTouch Terminal does while being fully portable. As with the ZeroTouch Terminal, all payment information collected by the device syncs back to the virtual terminal for reporting.

Payment Gateway

PayJunction’s proprietary gateway includes access to an all-purpose virtual terminal (compatible with a USB card swiper, making it a functional bare-bones POS in itself) as well as recurring billing and customer info vault features. Put it all together, and it’s a strong browser-based check and credit card processing system for card-present and card-not-present sales, with no card machine or paper filing required.

Supported Payment Types

• Credit, Debit, & Check Payment Processing: You can accept payments in-store or remotely using the PayJunction system.
• ACH Processing: If you hate the idea of driving to the bank to process your customers’ checks, you’re in luck; PayJunction offers ACH check processing at a rate of 0.75% with no monthly fee. You’ll enter your check-wielding customers’ checking account information once, and the system stores it for future payments. All ACH payments are encrypted to protect your customers’ data.
• Mobile Processing: PayJunction now sports its own branded mobile app for mobile payment processing. Only available to existing PayJunction customers, this free app works on all iOS devices (unfortunately, there is no Android app). We like that you can use the app to email receipts to your customers to sign remotely.
• Call-In Processing: No smartphone? No problem. You can call a transaction in through an automated system for low-tech mobile transactions.

Billing & Invoicing

• Electronic & Email Signature Capture: Taken together, this feature and PayJunction’s gateway comprise the essential elements of its “Paperless Processing” system, which requires minimal hardware and setup expenses. Collecting signatures on an electronic signature pad in-store eliminates the need to save signed receipt copies. PayJunction’s reporting system stores all signature data for easy access. Email signature collection (customers sign with their cursor) adds security to card-not-present transactions or agreements.
• One-Click Refunds: Issuing refunds can be time-consuming and inconvenient. That’s not the case with PayJunction. The system allows you to search past transactions by date, amount, name, or online invoice number. Once you find the transaction in question, you can issue a refund with just a click. You won’t need to call your customer for their credit card number or require your customer to bring their receipt back to you.
• Recurring Billing: Automate by setting up a payment schedule for installments, memberships, or subscriptions.
• Next-Day Deposits: This feature is available for qualifying business types.

eCommerce

• Free Hosted Checkout: PayJunction gives you two eCommerce options. PayJunction’s Hosted Checkout is nothing too fancy, but it’s simple to set up and will get the job done for many businesses. You can also integrate with 80+ third-party shopping carts.
• Developer Tools: PayJunction provides a “full-stack” API that delivers versatility and ease of use.
• Signature Capture: On card-not-present orders, you can mail your customer a receipt after the order and require a captured signature to prevent chargebacks.

Enterprise-Level Merchant Services

If you run an enterprise-level business, PayJunction lets you streamline your operations across multiple locations, merging your merchant accounts under one login to simplify your access to pertinent information.

Generate automated reports comparing departments or locations, track deposits to multiple bank accounts, restrict or grant access by location/department, and customize forms and receipts to meet your needs.

Fees & Rates

PayJunction’s high score in this category reflects its fully transparent processing rates and its lack of extraneous fees.

PayJunction uses interchange-plus with absolutely no other fees (aside from network fees, of course). That means you have no monthly fee, PCI fees, monthly minimums, gateway fees, etc. But be aware that if you do process under $10K monthly, a $35 monthly fee applies.

PayJunction’s baseline markup is 0.75%. Thankfully, no per-transaction fee markup applies, which can contribute to substantial savings, especially for small-ticket merchants. Note that this rate will only apply to businesses without a processing history.

If you do have a processing history, PayJunction will match or beat your current rates. You won’t have to worry about paying more when you switch. While pretty much any processor will be willing to match your current rates to win your business, it’s good that PJ advertises this. To qualify, you’ll need to provide two months of billing statements from your current processor.

The advertised rate and fee details include:

• Cards: Interchange + 0.75%, no per-transaction markup
• Checks: 0.75%, no per-transaction markup
• Monthly: No additional charge, or $35 for businesses doing under $10K monthly
• Annual: No additional charge
• PCI: No additional charge
• Gateway: No additional charge
• Exit Fee: No additional charge

PayJunction Fees Case Study

A solid markup for a business doing $12K per month in card-not-present sales might be 0.30% + $0.15, with a monthly fee of $20 (no PCI, no gateway fee). If that business had an average ticket of $50, it would pay the following with a good provider:

• $36 in markup percentage
• $36 in per-transaction markup
• $20 in monthly fees

This is a $92 total markup over interchange and still a pretty good value.

With PayJunction pricing, the same account would cost:

• $84 in markup cost

Remember that the larger your average ticket is and the more you process per month, the more your costs will rise above the comparison point. Still, PayJunction offers a solid deal, even if you don’t have a processing history.

If you’re having trouble grasping the complex world of payment processor pricing, check out our complete guide to credit card processing rates and fees.

Sales & Advertising Transparency

PayJunction earns excellent marks in this area, as the company goes beyond industry norms with its honest marketing. PayJunction correctly describes interchange and interchange-plus pricing (the company’s primary pricing model) on its company blog. Likewise, PayJunction seems to make good on its price-matching offer.

While some merchants may be wary of handing over processing statements, this serves an important purpose. First, it proves to PayJunction that you are processing the volume you say you are. With this added confidence, PayJunction can guarantee you the lowest rates possible instead of giving you a more conservative estimate. It also lets PayJunction see where you may have been overcharged so that it can explain the rationale behind the pricing quote offered to you.

We are generally wary of “rate-match” gimmicks, but in this case, PayJunction isn’t promising to hand over large sums of money if it can’t beat your rate. PayJunction is just using the information to get you a fair deal based on your existing volume.

Contract Length & Early Termination Fee

Your contract with PayJunction is completely month-to-month — no cancellation or early termination fees to worry about. These are the exact terms we like to see from a payment processor, and they are the reason PayJunction earns an excellent rating in this category.

One thing worth mentioning here is that in the Merchant Card Processing Agreement posted to the Terms and Conditions section of PJ’s website (albeit buried a few layers deep), the company references a $495 fee for the non-return of POS equipment if the merchant “terminates or ceases processing” before the expiration of the Merchant Agreement term and fails to return the equipment within ten days of said termination or processing halt.

As always, make sure to know what you’re agreeing to when you sign up with PayJunction or any other processor, and if you have concerns about this or any other contract provision, raise them with the processor before agreeing to anything.

Customer Service & Technical Support

PayJunction’s support and customer service are outstanding by all accounts, earning it an outstanding score in this category. It’s quite uncommon to see a company that combines a near-complete absence of complaints about customer service with a fair amount of public praise. PayJunction’s account representatives don’t just set up your account; they are also available to help you throughout. They bring the local experience to remote accounts. We love to see that!

You’ll also find a decent amount of self-service support features, including a good-sized knowledgebase and some useful tutorial videos. If you’re the type who likes to work things out yourself instead of getting on the phone, you can do so without any trouble.

Standard email-based ticket support is offered, as well as remote support. With remote support, you give a service representative remote access to your computer so that they can either walk you through something or take care of an issue for you. This level of support can be crucial in a pinch!

When a public complaint does pop up, PayJunction representatives act swiftly and thoroughly to make things right or provide a thoughtful explanation. The company goes well above and beyond what we’re used to seeing.

User Reviews

Why does PayJuntion score so well in this category? Well, just look at where PayJunction reviews currently sit with the big independent consumer review sites. I should note that between our PayJunction review update in 2022 and this one (December 2023), the company’s already-superb customer rating averages at these sites either remained constant or rose even higher than before. There was no slippage.

• Better Business Bureau: A+
• Capterra: 4.8 out of 5 stars
• G2: 4.7 out of 5 stars
• Trustpilot: 4.9 out of 5 stars

Final Verdict

From competitive interchange-plus rates to recurring billing to paperless payments to exceptional customer support, PayJunction delivers on its promises. What’s more, the overwhelming praise the company gets from happy users on review sites sets PayJunction apart in an industry rife with business-unfriendly practices. Even amongst PayJunction’s top credit card processing competitors, this degree of user satisfaction is unusual and noteworthy. Suffice to say, PayJunction earned this excellent rating.

On the other hand, low-volume merchants and new businesses with no processing history may find PayJunction to be overkill, as you’ll likely find cheaper options out there. If you foresee processing over $10K per month but don’t have an established processing history, you can sign on and then request a rate review after a few months once you’ve established your volume. For businesses with a processing history, PayJunction will match or beat your current rates.

Regardless of your business, PayJunction’s tangible benefits go beyond what you’ll find with standard-issue merchant account providers, so you should weigh the benefits against the potential expenses. With features such as integrated ACH processing, free Smart Terminals, free Hosted Checkout, a versatile gateway, integrated reporting, and exceptional customer support, there is no shortage of reasons to choose PayJunction.

While it’s always a good idea to look into our online credit card processor comparison chart before choosing a processor, I’d absolutely recommend giving thorough consideration to PayJunction.

Credit Card Processor Review Methodology

We evaluate and test each payment processor that we review at Merchant Maverick, placing special emphasis on certain key characteristics in order to generate our granular ratings for merchant accounts and credit card processors.

For payment processing reviews, we use a 24-point rubric to evaluate the provider. First, we look at pricing structure – interchange plus, subscription-based, tiered, or hybrid – giving the most points to providers that provide fair, transparent pricing and docking those that rely on tiered models. Then we examine rates, the presence and transparency of early termination fees, and any additional fees.

We also look at contract length and fairness and test out sales staff and customer service channels ourselves to ensure that the company uses reputable, above-the-board sales techniques. Finally, we take the company’s online reputation into account, reading customer reviews and comments.

Read more about how we rate payment processors.

The Merchant Maverick Seal of Approval 🏆

PayJunction	Visit Site

After hours of in-depth research and evaluation, we can confidently recommend this brand to our readers. Get started today and see PayJunction for yourself.

The Merchant Maverick Seal of Approval 🏆

PayJunction	Visit Site

After hours of in-depth research and evaluation, we can confidently recommend this brand to our readers. Get started today and see PayJunction for yourself.

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