Is anyone using a portable credit-card solution like Shopify, with Stripe and TroopTrack?
I’m trying to think of ways to make it easier to separate people from their money, when it comes to buying popcorn, renewing membership, paying for camps, etc.
Ideally, I’d like to have a PoS terminal (smartphone, tablet, etc.) with something like the Shopify gadget or Innerfence.
Has anyone got any experience they can share? Good, bad, the ugly?
Thanks in advance…
Yours in Scouting
Mike Ryder
Hi @njmike,
We recently signed up with Stripe and will be going live with it in September.
Trooptrack only supports Stripe and Paypal. There have been lots of questions about using either system and lots of ideas have been posted. Just do a search for Stripe, PayPal or credit cards :):)
I chose stripe for our troop because it is a credit card processor and can be easily integrated into TroopTrack. Once a stripe account is created, it needs to be tied to your TroopTrack account.
Here are the instructions to set up TroopTrack to accept Stripe transactions- Accept Credit Card Payment of Event Fees (01/09/2015)
With Stripe, there is no credit card (PoS) device. Everything is done via TroopTrack. Once accepting credit cards is turned on in TroopTrack, parents can deposit funds into their son’s scout account via Troop Track. Parents simply go to the money tab of the profile, and will see a deposit funds link see below-
This starts the credit card process. The parent types in the credit card information and is assessed a .25 cent processing fee from Trooptrack and a 2.9% processing fee from Stripe. I did a test transaction for $2.00 and it cost me 62 cents (.37 from Trooptrack and .25 from Stripe). The entire $2.00 deposit was added to my test account as well as the 37 cent processing fee. I actually paid $2.25 for the $2.00 deposit. See below-
Notice the Tender is Credit Card. The nice thing is the processing fee comes right out of the scout fund!
If you choose another method to accept credit cards, you will have to manually enter those transactions into TroopTrack. Stripe and PayPal are set up to work with TroopTrack.
This topic may give you more insight
I posted several comments under this topic. Signing Up with PayPal and Stripe.
I hope I didn’t give you too much information.
Regards,
Scott
oh no, not too much, this is good thank you!
The reason I mentioned Shopify is because it specifically integrates with Stripe.
My penultimate goal is to be able to both accept credit-cards through TroopTrack and at “Show and Sell” popcorn events, though I am having a tough time convincing my Treasurer that this is a great idea.
I appreciate the time you spent on that reply Scott, thanks.
We use PayPal with success. It’s pretty much the same as mentioned already about Stripe, but seemed to be more popular as most people already had a personal PayPal account. No one in my Pack had heard of Stripe prior to using TroopTrack. It’s simply a matter of preference.
We also use Square for processing credit cards outside of TroopTrack. This is handy for PoS payments from the non-Pack members. There is a transaction fee with Square as well but we add that fee to each transaction so the Pack doesn’t incur a ton of transaction fees. We haven’t had any complaint about it.
Hi @njmike ,
Sorry for the long delay in replying. I am on the same page as you. I’d love to accomplish the same thing as you.
I found Shopify too expensive and went with Square based on the feedback here and other places. We used Square at show and sells and it worked out really well. Money was deposited in a timely manner. the problem is it is not integrated into TT. So, it adds more work to the treasurer.
@areel- We just started using Stripe for credit cards. I really like it because it is integrated with TT. I don’t think the parents care about who processes the transaction as long as it is not too expensive and is safe. Our parents pay for their own processing charges with a setting in TT.
In my opinion the only downside to credit card payments, is that they can be used to pay for events. I would prefer they only be used to pay into scout accounts. I think it would be easier to track, and make things a bit cleaner. It would also parents to encourage to fund their scout account rather than pay with credit card for each event.
Just my 2 cents 
Scott
