Thinking about Payfirma for your payment processing needs?

We are a merchant services provider located in Vancouver, BC and were the first company to bring mobile payments to Canada. We are the recipient of the 2015 FinTech Company of the Year award.

We love helping people start businesses, grow businesses, and build great companies.

We’re a payment processor, the middleman between you and your merchant bank (acquirer). We provide you with your own merchant account and allow you to accept payments easily and efficiently.

We build technology that helps businesses get paid, makes sense out of payment data, and empowers merchants to make smarter decisions

Square is an aggregator, which means that you accept payments using their merchant account and are bundled into that account with other small businesses. Payfirma is a merchant account provider, so we provide you with your own merchant account with customized pricing and service plans that are unique to your business. Check out this article for a more in-depth comparison.

In addition, Payfirma is an omnichannel payment processor, meaning that you can accept payments any way you want to do business including online with eCommerce and virtual terminals; on premise with traditional terminals, tablet POS, and mobile devices; and in the field with mobile card readers or chip and pin devices. We also enable you to accept payments via recurring billing plans and e-invoicing tools. With point solutions like Square, Stripe, and PayPal, you are limited in the ways you can accept payments.

We’re by no means the only ones in the market. Payment processors are a dime a dozen. What separates us from the crowd is that instead of using several different service providers, such as Square for mobile and PayPal for eCommerce, you can use one, simple-to-use platform, PayHQ, to accept payments however you want to do business. This is called omnichannel payment processing.

If you’re a business operating in Canada or the U.S – you’re eligible for a Payfirma account! We like to assess businesses case by case because we know that every business is unique but in general, Payfirma is great for businesses processing over $40,000/year in credit card volume who are interested in expanding.

You’ll need to apply for a merchant account. A merchant account is a bank account that you must have to be able to accept payments.

Visit here to fill out your personal and business information, and one of our Payment Advisors will be in contact with you shortly.

We compiled a list of all the information you’ll need on hand when we walk you through the merchant account application process.

Typically, an application is approved within 3-5 business days. Account set-up and customer onboarding occur after approval, and you can start processing whenever you’re ready.

You get world class reporting, an easy-to-use payment processing platform, winning customer support, security, the ability to accept payments any way you want (online, in store, at the office, and in the field), and the peace of mind knowing you’ll never have to miss a sale.

And we’ve been known to give out some pretty awesome unicorn shirts.

While we can only take on Canadian and American clients at the moment, our cloud-based platform means that you can take payments anywhere in the world as long as you have an internet connection or data plan.

Yes, our mobile app is available in the App Store, right on the front page of the business section.

Typically, you’ll see funds deposited in your bank account in as fast as 1-2 business days.

You can accept any type of credit card.

Yes -- with our traditional terminals, you can accept Interac Debit. With any of our payment channels, you can accept Visa Debit.

• Credit cards
• Debit cards
• Prepaid credit cards
• Mobile wallet payments such as Apple Pay
• Bitcoin

Card processing rate is the rate charged for accepting credit cards. This is typically 1.99% + $0.25 per transaction but will vary depending on your processing volume.
Monthly fee covers your card processing statements and account maintenance (performed by our Customer Success team), and access to seven different payment channels.
Cross-border (International) fee is charged if your customer pays with a card issued outside of Canada/U.S.
Minimum processing fee for businesses that process less than $2500 per month.
One-time setup fee of $25.
An optional mobile card reader to take payments on the go is $99.
An optional NFC-enabled traditional terminal starts at $25/month

There is a $25 one-time set-up fee.

Yes, it ranges from $300-$500 depending on your account.

You can take mobile payments by swiping credit cards on your mobile device or tablet with a swiper/dongle/card reader plugged into the audio jack or with an EMV terminal (chip and pin).

You can also accept payments made by mobile phones on our Traditional Terminals. This is made possible by NFC (near field communication), the technology that allows 2 enabled devices to transfer data to each other by tapping the devices together or bringing them within close proximity.

You can take payments with the tablet with a card reader. With the Tablet POS, you can also store products, photos, SKUs, and prices in an organized inventory.

On Web Terminal, simply type in the payment details, and you can authorize or process a payment on any browser (with an internet connection).

Recurring Billing allows you to enter customer payment information once and then subscribe them to a plan for automated, periodic payments.

With Digital Invoicing, you can create and customize invoices that are unique to your brand. Your customers receive an email with an option to pay right on the invoice.

The privacy and security of our customers are of utmost importance to us. You can read our full privacy policy here.

Yes! As a merchant account provider, we help ensure that you are PCI-compliant -- at no extra cost to you.

It’s a security standard set by the PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard) that helps reduce credit card fraud. PCI compliance is a set of 12 requirements designed to ensure a secure environment for payment processing and applies to anyone who deals with credit cards.

EMV is otherwise known as chip and pin and is a global standard for credit and debit payment cards based on chip card technology. Canada has employed EMV for several years now.

But if you’re a U.S. merchant, you may be affected if you have not updated your terminals. As of October 2015, U.S. shifted the liability of fraud onto merchants if they accept a Chip and PIN card with a non-EMV terminal. Contact us to get EMV protected today.

Head over to the Payfirma Support Center for a comprehensive help guide or email [email protected].

We are proud to have the industry’s best customer support and success team.

We are always available to help, you can:

• Shoot us an email at [email protected]


• Call us at + 1.800.747.6883. We’ll answer the phone from our headquarters in Vancouver.


• Tweet us questions, concerns, or musings at @payfirma.


• Is Facebook more your speed? Message us here.


• Live chat with us. Just click the How can we help? tab at the bottom right of the page.

Just shoot us an email at [email protected] or call us at + 1.800.747.6883.