In a study evaluating small businesses’ satisfaction with merchant services providers, J.D. Power found that banks outperformed nonbank fintech firms and scale processors. Bank acquirers scored 863 on a 1,000-point scale for overall satisfaction, followed closely by bank joint ventures with First Data (847), nonbank fintech companies like PayPal, Square and Intuit (843) and scale processors (806).
Satisfaction is partly driven by business customers having deeper relationships with bank acquirers, J.D. Power said. Ninety-seven percent of small businesses working with a bank acquirer used another service offered by the bank, compared with 75 percent of those working with a nonbank fintech acquirer and 52 percent working with a scale processor.
Satisfaction was higher among users of newer technologies, such as mobile card readers and cloud-based point-of-sale systems, and was substantially higher among e-commerce merchants than card-present merchants. The American Bankers Association endorses the merchant services program offered by First Data Community Financial Institutions.
