Is Your Window Cleaning Business Taking Credit Cards?

Square has been on the US market a while now, iZettle is poised to take over the European market. Click the picture to take you to Square.

Accept credit cards on your Apple or Android device with no contract, monthly fees, or merchant account required. Every user receives a free Square credit card reader in the mail. Within minutes of downloading the app, you're ready to take payments.

- For everyone. Now individuals and businesses can accept credit card payments anywhere, from garage sales to coat checks to coffee shops.

- Easy to use. Plug in your free card reader and start swiping. Track sales, tips, tax and send electronic receipts.

- Safe and secure. Square meets all industry-standard security practices to ensure safety for you and your customers.

Square is an innovative point of sale solution that replaces your cash register and credit card terminal. Square accepts all major debit and credit cards: Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover. Now when you swipe a card with Square or Card Case there is just one fee: 2.75%. What you see is what you pay. Square and Card Case let you accept credit cards quickly and easily, using what you already have in your pocket: your phone. When you want to know how much money you’ve made, a simple multiplication will do. No more scrambling with complex fees and hidden costs. If you enter credit card numbers manually, your cost will then be 3.5% + 15¢ per transaction.

Getting Started:

1. Download the "Square" App for Apple or Android

2. Activate your account

3. Accept credit cards

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Click to go to izettle.

iZettle, Europe’s answer to Square, is out of beta: Stockholm-based iZettle — a company that is building a payments system not entirely unlike the much-heralded Square — is taking a big step forwards today by coming out of beta. The system, which consists of a plug-in device and app, goes live today, with approval from Visa, MasterCard and Europay, and focus on helping small merchants and individuals — many who don’t currently take card payments. The full commercial launch only covers Sweden right now, but now it’s officially up and running after a trial period that started in August, it’s ready to grow quickly. The company recently took $11 million of funding to help exactly that expansion.

According to MasterCard’s Matt Taraldsson, the card provider will be helping it roll out across the continent soon. “Since its launch in Sweden in August iZettle has proven to be a big success, and has clearly shown that small businesses and individuals appreciate the convenience and security of taking card payments anytime, anywhere. We are proud that iZettle continues to build on MasterCard’s expertise – and as they now initiate their commercial launch across Europe we think it’s great news that millions of merchants for the first time will be able to take card payments”

There’s clearly an opportunity here, and Square has been making a lot of noise — not least because of CEO Jack Dorsey’s zen-like appearance at GigaOM’s RoadMap conference last week. But no doubt skeptics will no doubt look on iZettle as little more than a clone of Square: yet another example of a European company copying an American rival in order to corner the market first. Pricing, for example, fits the bill: just like Square, iZettle takes a 2.75 percent cut of each transaction for processing. But iZettle also takes a fee of €0.16 (22 US cents) per transaction on top, making it slightly more expensive to use. The clone argument is a little unfair to iZettle, however, since it has had to build an entirely different technology for processing payments. Its gadget is slightly larger than Square’s box, and it’s one which plugs into the bottom of an iPhone, rather than the headphone jack at the top. This isn’t just a matter of looking different for the sake of it, however: it’s practical.

The simple magnetic swipe system used by most American cards (and therefore by Square) is pretty antiquated to Europeans, who largely used chip-based PIN entry to verify their purchases. That means payment devices need to have a card inserted into them, rather than using a quick swipe-and-sign approach. It also means, theoretically, that the services are more secure by design: something that could be useful as iZettle looks to expand into new territories. The bigger point is that both companies are working to change the payments industry, one of the largest markets around, and one of the least dynamic. Yes, there are plenty of similarities between the two — but there’s more than enough room for several players right now.

Carphone Warehouse co-founder Charles Dunstone and Index Ventures have invested €8.2m ($11.2m) in iZettle, Europe’s answer to mobile-payment firm Square. Sweden’s iZettle operates a payment system for small or nomadic merchants – be they market traders, window cleaners or conference-goers – through a card reader that attaches to the bottom of an iPhone. Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey’s other start-up, Square, requires the swipe of a magnetic card for its iPhone payment terminal. It is already processing a run rate of $2bn worth of payments a year through 800,000 merchants, raising $100m at a reported $1bn valuation in June.

But iZettle’s backers still think it can steal a march in Europe because its payment system works with chip-and-pin credit cards – which are rare in the US but predominant in much of the rest of the world. Chip and pin is more secure but also more complicated. iZettle has nailed not only the hardware and the payment process but also obtained relevant regulatory clearance in its native Sweden, of which there is a more than a little. It is compliant with EMV (the Europay, MasterCard and VISA card approval body) and the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI-DSS).