Is Swipe HQ heading towards a train wreck

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Martin_NZ

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#185834 7-Dec-2015 13:53

Hi All,

Is there anyone else here the uses SwipeHQ for credit card / eftpos / mobile payment solutions.

Things seem to be going from bad to worse at breakneck speed.

Over the last couple of months there have been numerous service outages with things as fundamental as letting SSL certs expire, dns issues, incorrect fraud detection emails being sent and multiple other obscure service failures leaving those who rely on Swipe HQ to process their electronic transactions up the proverbial without a paddle.

Does anyone know why these things keep occurring and why so frequently of late.

Last week for example their service was down for some merchants for all of the latter part of the week. Things came back to "normal" on Friday and it was down again over the weekend.

I understand they provide a fairly low cost option for smaller merchants who cannot afford or want to pay a monthly service fee but everyone wants a service that is reliable. Low cost should not mean broken.

I'd be keen to hear any others experience with Swipe

Thanks
Marty

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#1442038 7-Dec-2015 14:08

I think @nate uses them...

Flickky

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#1442060 7-Dec-2015 14:42

I'd be interested too - one of my mates decided to go with Swipe during the setup of his business. Took him about ~6 weeks to get up and running and he's had issues with them ever since.

Martin_NZ

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#1442083 7-Dec-2015 15:06

I've been using them for years.

They were really good and I had no complaints up until a few months ago when things seem to have taken a drastic turn for the worse.

Last few weeks there have been lengthy outages every week sometimes for days at a time.

mattwnz

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#1442099 7-Dec-2015 15:24

I tried to signup to them a while ago after my old provider went out of business. But the process I found was too difficult, so never bothered going with them, and instead went the Paypal route, which is probably as rpbust as you will find. I see swipe have a big notice at the top of their homepage about the outage.

Martin_NZ

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#1442113 7-Dec-2015 15:37

Yes and I see it was down yesterday from 11am - 9:30pm. It's a fairly long length of time for any business to not be able to process transactions especially leading up to Christmas.

Us online merchants simply lose customers, those in retail have angry people right in their face and all they can do is apologise and point them at an ATM and hope they come back.

I wouldn't mind so much if it was an isolated incident, but it's not. There have been numerous outages of similar length or longer over the last few months.

nate

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#1442179 7-Dec-2015 16:31

We (cafe) use them for the Geekzone IRL evenings, our volume isn't huge, but it's cheap to put payments through.

Can't say I've had any issues lately, they are the only cheap provider now that KiwiPay has pulled the plug.

miked

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#1442506 8-Dec-2015 09:35

The charity I work for has been using them for 3 years now and they have typically been very good. Their charity rates are particularly good, charging only 0.95% per transaction, no monthly fee or minimum fee.

Never really had any major problems. Quality of support has been variable when contacting them for help, but nothing too dire (certainly worth enduring for the great price).

However I have been watching the recent growth of outages with concern. They've had several phone system outages, then several lengthy payment processing outages, and it has made me more nervous about their long term viability. We are not planning to jump ship (yet), but we are watching them closely, not that I currently have a "plan B" up my sleeve. (I hear DPS and ANZ can do 0.75% + 20c for charities for donations only - so that might be an option for us).

Mike

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nate

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#1448816 11-Dec-2015 16:48

Not completely confirmed, but just had this conversation on Twitter and it seems like their are in liquidation:

@nate Im not 100% convinced https://t.co/wl586Ie9Uy

— Jess McKenzie (@jzm) December 11, 2015

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#1448821 11-Dec-2015 17:00

Nate's link is legitimate.

Oh that's really disappointing. I would much rather they had been another great Kiwi Success Story.

The story has not yet hit the news. You heard it hear first, folks.

“Don't believe anything you read on the net. Except this. Well, including this, I suppose.” Douglas Adams

Referral links to services I use, really like, and may be rewarded if you sign up:
PocketSmith for budgeting and personal finance management. A great Kiwi company.

freitasm

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#1448824 11-Dec-2015 17:10

No surprise there.

freitasm

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#1448825 11-Dec-2015 17:12

And their website has a "Temporary service outage" message in large red font.

Yeah, right.

Martin_NZ

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#1448832 11-Dec-2015 17:58

I'm not convinced it's the same company. Swipehq says powered by optimizer not optimizerhq and the addresses are different. Perhaps an unfortunate coincidence if not it certainly explains why their service has been so poor recently. This following outages yesterday and again today. I did receive a payment to my account this morning so if they are in liquidation today I'm pleased i got paid for the latest batch of transactions.

Keep us updated with any developments.

miked

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#1448838 11-Dec-2015 18:11

Optimizer itself hasn't gone yet.... but has been predicted by many to be on its way into liquidation, but I don't think it is definite either way yet.

https://www.business.govt.nz/companies/app/ui/pages/companies/4398098?backurl=%2Fcompanies%2Fapp%2Fui%2Fpages%2Fcompanies%2Fsearch%3Fmode%3Dstandard%26type%3Dentities%26q%3Doptimizer

Manas had two companies go into liquidation yesterday (the one Nate listed and another), and Optimizer might well follow. Equally, they might be trying to sell it as a going concern, who knows.

There is a Facebook group following the movements of SwipeHQ and there is lots of speculation on the final state of the impending wreck, but it isn't over until it is over.

There was a helpful comment someone posted in that group where a Swipe supervisor said it wasn't confirmed either way, but that if Swipe went into liquidation, it wouldn't be a sudden halt to services, but id it happened, the process would be that customers would then be contacted to inform them of what would happen next. That all traded money would be safe, even in a liquidation situation, because it was held in a trust account, so no-one should lose any settlements. I'll see if I can post a link to both the Facebook group, and also the post from the Swipe supervisor.

I'm now actively hunting an alternative payment processor for our charity.

Mike

miked

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#1448842 11-Dec-2015 18:35

Facebook Group:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/1516755805304999/

Can't easily post message as it is a photo though.

Mike

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#1449139 12-Dec-2015 11:58

Seems Swipe's K1 Reader mobile service is to be turned off Monday. (BNZ are offering a deal to ex-Swipe customers looking to take mobile payments.)

The online payments side of Swipe will carry on working just fine, and that part of the business has been sold to a competitor. Not sure which company but rumours suggest e-way, but I guess that will come out in due course.

All this info from the Facebook group (link in my post above). You need to join to see anything though.

Mike

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