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Leaders Merchant Services is a credit card processing company based in California. It was founded in 2000 and it is currently an ISO (Independent Sales Organization) of First Data and iPayment, meaning a lot of their products and services are provided by these two companies.
Leaders addresses all types of businesses, from banks, hotels and restaurants to B2B companies, healthcare providers, gas stations or rental companies. It has over 100,000 customers.
Leaders offers a wide range of products and services, from credit/debit card processing and check assurance and acceptance to mobile processing, POS systems (with Clover), virtual terminals, merchant cash advance and an online shopping cart (it integrates with QuickBooks).
Their website is pretty elusive. They don’t display any prices and you have to call for almost any information you need.
One drawback regarding their pricing is the fact that they require you to generate a minimum of $25/month of processing costs, so small businesses would be advised to search for a provider that has no such conditions. Generally speaking, Leaders Merchant Services is better tailored for medium or large sized businesses.
Just like most of the merchant account providers, Leaders Merchant Services uses tiered pricing. Their rates on qualified debit cards are quite good: 2.5%. There is a 2.4% per mid-qualified card transaction and a 2.9% per non-qualified card transaction.
A good thing for merchants with credit issues is the fact that the company has an approval rating of 99%, so customers with low credit ratings will also be accepted.
Leaders Merchant Services has a lot of bad reviews regarding their lack of transparency, deceptive marketing and hidden fees. Their reps are constantly accused of misinforming the customers or hiding information about taxes and fees. There were several cases when clients opened an account and Leaders closed it the next day with no explanation, asking for termination fees. Make sure and thoroughly inform yourself before signing anything.
Among the most common complaints they received we can mention the undisclosed early termination fee, the difficulty in cancelling the account (on the other hand, users complained about their account being closed without their consent – read above), deceitful advertising and sales and sudden rises in fees (they initially offer low tiered rates but you have no guarantee that they will remain low).
They accept several cards: Visa, Mastercard, American Express and Discover. Regarding the payment gateway, they use Authorize.Net.
Leaders offers generous options of equipment, hardware and software. The hardware is provided by First Data and VerfiFone, and if you want, you can purchase it directly from those companies, possibly at a lower price. Leaders tries to sell you on a lease contract, which is a profitable thing for them.
They offer Clover POS systems, from the Clover Station to Clover Mini and Clover Mobile:
Leaders is Android and iPhone/iPad compatible but incompatible with Windows or Blackberry.
On the list of features and capabilities we can add EMV Chip Cards, Loyalty/Gift Cards, eChecks/Electronic Checks, Snail Mail Orders, recurring payments and international sales.
The standard contract is a 3year one. There is a monthly fee, a PCI compliance fee ($129/year) and a monthly non-compliance fee ($40). The early termination fee ranges between $250 and $350, depending on the time of cancellation. They also have a swiped rate as low as 0.35% and a keyed rate as low as 1.79%.
Phone: 800-220-4143
Social media: LinkedIn, Twitter, Google+, Facebook
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/leadersmerchantprocessing
Twitter: https://twitter.com/growwithleaders
Leaders offers free of charge 24/7 customer support and a free setup consultation. That might not seem like much, given that customer service should be free, but considering the way competition handles this aspect, it is a definite plus for them.
You can reach them by phone or live chat, but while they are mostly reachable, they are not always helpful. Your technical questions may not receive the necessary attention or answers because the reps will be too busy to make a sales pitch over the phone. They are more interested in advertising their services and making a sale than they are concerned about actually helping you solve your issues.
The web resources are also rather scarce, so aside from a FAQ section, don’t expect to get too much help from their website.
Our editorial staff evaluates products and services independently, but Best Review Guide may earn money when you click on links. Read our advertising disclosure.
By: Kurtis | Last updated April 12, 2017 
