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CrossCheck’s Plus Sales: The ‘Buck Stops’ in Check Guarantee

Posted by Brandes Elitch | Mon, Jan 07, 2019 @ 06:45 AM
check guaranteeAt CrossCheck, our primary business is helping merchants make a sale when a consumer is standing in front of them. Since the completion of a sale often hangs by a thread, this sense of urgency is the inspiration behind our Plus Sales service — the place where the proverbial “buck stops” in the realm of check guarantee. Let me explain.

If you have ever worked in retail, you know that you generally have only one shot at making the sale. If the consumer says, “I’ll be back later,” well, as we say around here, “The be-back bus doesn’t stop here anymore.”

This is where it gets interesting.

Why Do Americans Ride the Be-Back Bus?

Most Americans, even those getting paid the big bucks, are stretched very thin every month.

  • bus soft focusA study by lender Springleaf Financial showed that nearly a quarter of American consumers have less than $250 in their bank account on any given payday.
  • Twenty percent of those making $200,000 a year say they save rarely or not at all. A quarter of those people with graduate degrees say that couldn’t miss a month of paychecks without needing to borrow or sell assets.
  • A FINRA study in 2016 at the Investor Education Foundation showed that 48 percent of those people using credit cards cannot pay their balance in full every month.
  • A study by CardRates.com called “2018 Credit Card Debt Statistics” shows that the average household carries $8161 in revolving debt, of which $6571 is credit card debt. This is serious!

The last situation is serious because it means that the money going to pay interest, typically at a high rate, and cannot be spent on other things — things that absolutely, positively have to get done, such as taking a sick dog to the vet, paying the dentist to fix a blinding toothache, paying for a funeral, or replacing the old car when it breaks down for the last time. This is where CrossCheck comes in.

Why Merchants Prefer Check Guarantee

Many merchants don’t want to pay three percent interchange (based on the rates set by the card brands and the fees loadingprocessor markup) for a high-dollar transaction such as buying a car.

For this reason, auto dealers will routinely ask you to write a check instead of using a credit card. Of course, the issue is that they don’t really know for certain if that high-dollar check is going to clear the bank. They need certainty about that, because otherwise they will have to do a “rollback” on the sale, which is the last thing that they ever want to do.

When they use a check guarantee company like CrossCheck, they know that if they just follow the simple authorization process and we provide an authorization number, they will get paid. Sounds simple, and it is!

Where the Buck Stops and Where the Bus Doesn’t

One of the ways we at CrossCheck distinguish ourselves from our two primary competitors is by proving that we approve more checks and have fewer declines. We do this by looking at the competitor’s statement and Bus Station with Plus Sales_bfinding misleading phrases like “money saved,” “loss prevention,” or “declined savings.” What these phrases really mean is that our competitor declined a check and the merchant lost a sale. This is a bad thing and the source for many a merchant to inquire about our services.

But sometimes a merchant is locked into a long-term contract with our competitor and cannot move over to us right now. For that situation, we created a service called “Plus Sales.”

When a merchant such as a car dealer gets a decline from their existing check guarantee vendor, they phone our 24/7 Customer Service department to get the check guaranteed.

We approve the check, the car is sold, and the taillights move over the curb!

So if you are a car dealer, an auto aftermarket vendor, or work in other businesses like building supply centers or furniture stores selling high-ticket items, fear not if you are locked into a contract with another check guarantee company.

Plus Sales truly is where “buck stops” in check guarantee.

Just contact CrossCheck and we will set you up on our Plus Sales program, so you can sell a few extra cars or bedroom sets or building supply orders each month. Download our free guide to learn more about Plus Sales.

Plus Sales Check Approval Program Guide

Topics: Brandes Elitch, Plus Sales, Check Guarantee

Written by Brandes Elitch

Brandes Elitch is Director of Partner Acquisition for CrossCheck Inc. A certified cash manager and accredited ACH professional, he garnered a Master of Business Administration from New York University and a Juris Doctor from Santa Clara University.