Sage Payment Solutions, the payments division for Sage North America, today announced general availability for Sage Mobile Payments. The Payment Card Industry (PCI) compliant mobile payments product comes bundled with a Sage merchant account to allow SMBs to expand their payment options by accepting credit and debit cards on 400+ types of mobile phones and computing devices, across all major wireless carriers. Sage Payment Solutions is offering Sage Mobile Payments for a nominal set-up fee, a monthly fee as low as $10.95, and no incremental mobile processing or transaction fees. The product is also available with an optional, end-to-end encrypted card reader (card swiper).

"SMBs need to look at total cost of ownership when it comes to selecting a mobile payments solution," said Greg Hammermaster, president of Sage Payment Solutions. "Some competing mobile payments offerings add 1 percent plus upwards of 37 cents to the processing fees, which can easily turn into well over $130 in extra fees for every $10,000 in credit card volume. While this pricing is good for individuals that don't process a lot of credit card transactions, it can be quite costly for businesses using their mobile device to process credit cards on a regular basis."

Sage Payment Solutions believes that the most cost-effective mobile payments offering for an SMB customer consists of a reasonable monthly fee and no additional transaction fee surcharges. "In the end, we don't view the mobile device as a profit center," said Hammermaster. "Mobile payments is an important solution in our suite to help customers expand their sales channels and generate revenues."

Sage Mobile Payments is available with an optional card reader (card swiper), with end-to-end encryption from the card reader device to the application. "End-to-end encryption for any payment transaction is now a requirement in the business community, and Sage Payment Solutions is committed to meeting that demand," said Hammermaster.

Sage Mobile Payments is PCI compliant, and adheres to the highest possible standards in the payment industry. All customer data flowing through Sage Mobile Payments is encrypted before it leaves a customer's cell phone; no personal data is retained on the phone or mobile computing device.

Sage Mobile Payments will soon seamlessly integrate to Sage Exchange, a secure, Payment Card Industry (PCI) certified payments platform that can automatically update a numerous Sage-developed accounting, enterprise resource planning (ERP), fundraising, medical practice management, and billing and time tracking systems with payments data to help eliminate the cost, hassle, and inaccuracy associated with manual data entry. Sage Exchange also integrates with a number of third-party business management products and services.

The SMB Group, a research firm focused exclusively on researching and analyzing the highly fragmented SMB market, is currently conducting a Small and Medium (SMB) Business Payment Solutions Study. Preliminary data from that study shows that 3 percent of SMBs accept mobile payments today, and suggests that this number will increase to 7 percent in the next 12 months, and 16 percent by the end of 2012.

"A business of virtually any size can benefit from the ability to process mobile payments," said Sanjeev Aggarwal, founder and partner of The SMB Group. "From larger companies with employees in the field, to micro-businesses exhibiting at trade fairs, all need to process payments and do business on-the-go. Sage Payment Solutions seems to have figured out that mobile payment products are business tools, not gadgets. The company is providing small and midsized businesses with an affordable solution, without charging a premium for using it."

As announced in October 2010, Sage Payment Solutions has partnered with ROAM Data, an industry leader in mobile commerce solutions, to bring Sage Mobile Payments to market. The product works with Apple's iPhone and iPad, Motorola's DROID phones, and Research in Motion's BlackBerry, plus hundreds of other mobile devices. Using Sage Mobile Payments, businesses and organizations can:

* Quickly and securely process credit and debit card orders, with real-time authorization;
* Use an optional low-cost, secure card reader;
* Log cash orders, download reports online, and email receipts to their customers;
* Rapidly change applications or add features to mobile apps that may benefit them; and
* Experience seamless integration with their Sage accounting, ERP, fundraising products, plus other third-party products.