| LED Digest 1524: Double-Edged Swords |
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================================================== The LED Digest Moderated Discussion List "Effective Online Advertising, Since 1997" ================================================== List Moderator: Published by: Adam Audette LED Digest ................................................. February 24, 2003 Issue #1524 ................................................. .....IN THIS DIGEST..... ==== CONTINUING ================= --== International Fraud Protection ==-- ~ Andrew Muigai "Worldpay [stated] the problem was the region where our business is located." ~ Barry Morgan "...in any situation...we will require the funds to be wired or sent by certified check." ~ John Smart "...it is really bad when the customer is alienated." --== Copyright Notices ==-- ~ Andreas Huttenrauch "...a last update notice on a web site can be a double edged sword." ===== GEEK TIPS ================== --== Space Around Forms ==-- ~ Viggie Bala ~ Veronica Yuill ==== BILLBOARD =================== --== Web Statistics Software ==-- ~ Peter Warnock ~ Bob Cavanagh ===== CONTINUING ================================= From: Andrew Muigai Subject: Fraud Prevention or Discrimination? Hello Adam, I am much provoked to contribute to the ongoing discussion (LED Digest 1522) on the balance between fraud prevention and discrimination. I run an Africa travel site, Africapoint.com from Nairobi, Kenya. We target the inbound travel market and the bulk of our clients are from Western Europe and North America. About 2 years ago after a lot of frustration trying to obtain an online credit card processing solution I appealed to this forum for help. I got the excellent advise that I should apply to Worldpay.com. Our business was accepted and we were soon happily accepting online payments. At this point let me say that for online documentation, integration and most of all customer service Worldpay has been very good. But on one unforgettable morning last October, I received a "Dear Customer" form letter via email with the grim header "News- Disconnection of service". In this letter they explained that our account would be discontinued due to circumstances arising from the terrorist attacks in the US the previous year and particularly new rules related to money laundering etc. The main point was that our business is based in a country where Worldpay would no longer be servicing. In a follow-up, I pointed out that we actually have a merchant account for off-line processing (fax and card present) with Barclays Bank and had never been notified of problems with our Worldpay account. In a reply they conceded that it had nothing to do with our particular business but the problem was the region where our business is located. In the earlier days of the Internet some prophesied that the net would level the playing field and the location of a business would no longer matter. I never believed them. But I still find the experience I have narrated above frustrating and I can justifiably claim that we are facing discrimination. As I did 2 years ago, I would like to appeal to this forum for advise on how I can settle this question of obtaining an online credit card processing solution without having to relocate overseas. Best wishes, Andrew Muigai, Managing Director Africapoint.com, The Africa Travel Website http://www.africapoint.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Barry Morgan Subject: Fraud protection We have been deceived by international and in-conus customers as well. Due to our large equipment size and the unique locations of our customers throughout the world we had to merge ecommerce methods with our in house system of dealing with sales. With this process we complete approximately 200 + orders per month, 50 % are international. Our sales method is as such: The Customer orders equipment or supplies - the customer gets an email stating the order was received and that we will be in contact by phone to verify shipping rates and locations. During that contact we fax or email over a sales order for the customer to sign and provide the security details to enable the transaction. They fax that info back to us. That gives us some relief on charge backs as we get signatures on sales orders to provide to the credit card investigators. As we are selling industrial equipment to businesses, almost all have email and fax so the very few that balk are subject to more scrutiny over the deal. We have had some failures with this model as well, mainly on orders that use multiple credit cards with different names on them. That number is only 1 or 2 a year however, while we would love to not accept that method it is typical for a startup business to use each of the partner's personal credit lines to purchase our equipment. However in any situation if we feel it is not a good we will require the funds to be wired or sent by certified check. As for dealing with consistently bad sources of leads or sales, we locate a reseller or distributor in that location, provide them a generous commission and then send them the leads or sales inquiries for them to sort out in those locations. That provides an opportunity for the rest of those potential sales that are lost otherwise by pigeon holing customer interest by geographic location. Hope this helps! Regards, Barry Morgan, Online Business Development Printa Systems, Inc. http://www.printa.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: John Smart Subject: Fraud protection Having been living in both the UK and the US I am very familiar with the problems as a consumer. But I work as a business man, not as a consumer. If you want to get server space from me, you can do in many ways - I don't care what country you are from, or what your credit rating is. Your skin color and native tongue are of no interest to me at all. All I want, to be blunt, is your money. If you are not in my country, then you have to pay in advance. If that is inconvenient, then I am sorry, but tough. Why should my other clients have to pay more to cover fraudsters? Of course, if you are spending money with me, then you are clearly an individual of great taste and who must be totally honest. Please do give me your money! I will, in return, give an excellent service. But if you are not a local person, I want payment in advance, cleared in my account, before I give you anything. I truly apologize for any inconvenience, but I cannot afford to sponsor the fraudulent people overseas. For that matter, I cannot afford to support the fraudulent people stateside. It is just easier to take local protection. (I am working on a joke about a 6,000 mile condom, but it probably isn't going to be worth the effort!). Maybe I can tidy the above up and put it on my web site. In the mean time, if you need hosting services, and you are not in the USA, please try me - you will get a great service, there will just be a delay as we get going (and to ease the pain, I will even give you a free month to compensate for this - once our relationship is established). To put all the above into a nutshell - it is really bad when the customer is alienated. But as business people we have to choose fairness - of our time to this and all our other clients. Where will the cost of time investment go? Who pays for it? Other customers. There has to be a balance - the above is a balance for me that works. I also import computer hardware. One manufacturer I work with is based in Thailand. I have to pay to transfer funds into his bank to make a purchase, then wait for him to ship the goods. I have no problem with that - a little frustration at the cost to me (in time and money), but I know that my money is paying for the goods - not for the fraud that cost him $xxxxx over the past year. John Smart, Technical Director InternetDesign.com - A Human Touch in a Digital World (TM) ------- new post - new topic ------- From: Andreas Huttenrauch Subject: Copyright > ... wouldn't it be easier to put a last updated date > on the page if you are worried that the visitor viewing > the page might think that the page is from 2001? - Vicki Lambert, LED 1521 In my opinion a last update notice on a web site can be a double edged sword. Most web sites that look outdated or have an elderly copyright notice or last update notice are not taken seriously. A page that's one year old is considered ancient on the web. If you're going to have a last update notice on a page, then you should make sure to update the page regularily to avoid the site looking abandoned, or make sure that the page can look outdated without affecting the rest of the site. Andreas Huttenrauch Globi Web Solutions ===== GEEK TIPS =================================== From: Viggie Bala Subject: Form space > When you make a form, it seems to force some space > around itself on the page... when your form is an image > or button, any surrounding text is forced away... - Phil Chave, LED 1521 Forcing text to sit on the button? Are you using a standard image for button and prefer to have a text appear above the image? This part of Phil's post is a bit vague. However, the following link explains about the new 'button' tag in HTML4 and explains using images (including animated) on a button and various other options. http://www.javascriptkit.com/howto/button.shtml If you prefer to have a text link to work as form submit button, here are some explanations, http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/textsubmit.shtml http://forums.devshed.com/showthread.php?threadid=12587 Hope that helps in some way. Viggie Bala Web solutions thru' the net. http://www.viggie.com/ ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Veronica Yuill Subject: Form space > A fix to this issue is to put the form tags outside > of whatever tags you are working in. - Anne McKay, LED 1523 Or, if you really want to "flatten out" your form, use CSS: <.style> FORM{display:inline} <./style> which will remove all white space from around the form. Veronica Yuill, Moderator I-Design ==== BILLBOARD ==================================== From: Peter Warnock Subject: Web stats > I was hoping if someone could please give me > some advice as to a good web statistics software. - D. Diehl, LED 1523 We use Urchin from http://www.urchin.com . Virtualhosting.com, our virtual server host, picks up the tab for the licensing and incorporated it into the monthly fee, which makes the feauture-rich content affordable. Peter Warnock webstruction.com ------- new post - same topic ------- From: Bob Cavanagh Subject: Web stats About a year ago I benefited greatly from the advice of other contributors to this newsletter. A number of web server log analysers were mentioned. I looked at quite a few, and tried a couple. In the end I settled for Webtrends Log Analyzer from NetIQ. This product is not cheap but it has worked very well for us. And when I ran into troubles (of my own making) there was friendly help and support at the end of the phone line. Bob Cavanagh, Director of Technology Queen's School of Business ------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1995-2003 Adam Audette. All Rights Reserved. ----------------------------------------------------------------- |
