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Can a credit card terminal be set up to handle 2 merchant accounts?

Yes!  If you have different types of businesses operating in the same location, yes, you can take payments for both businesses with one credit card terminal.  Both merchant accounts will be downloaded into the terminal and the first question on the terminal during a purchase will be to ask which merchant account you will be using for the deposit.

Visa and MasterCard regulations require that one business cannot take payments for another business.  Bank accounts work the same way. The bank or merchant accounts are specific to a business.  You cannot deposit checks made out to Business A in Business B’s bank account. You cannot deposit credit card payments for one business into a merchant account for another business.  If you do, your customer will get a line item on their credit card statement to a business where they did not make a purchase. They can charge it back and the merchant will lose that chargeback 100% of the time.

Here is an example.  Maybe you offer hot air balloon rides as a side business to your restaurant.  You cannot deposit credit card transactions for balloon rides into the restaurant merchant account.  You must have a separate terminal or a separate merchant account in a terminal set up to toggle back and forth between two accounts.

Here is another example.  You have an auto repair shop and your wife sells burritos off a table in your shop. You must have two merchant accounts for each business, but you can share the same credit card terminal properly set up with both merchant accounts.

Give us a call at 505-296-2847 to also save on fees when you want to share a terminal with two merchant accounts!

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