Description

Overview: 

The Pampered Chef, a Berkshire Hathaway company, is the premier provider of professional-quality tools for cooking and entertaining. With a product line that includes more than 500 offerings—from entertaining to cookware, cutlery to cookbooks, stoneware to spices—coupled with an interactive direct sales method, TPC offers a unique and affordable solution to make cooking and entertaining easier. TPC was in need of a universal payment platform that both accommodated the company’s various sales channels and could integrate into its existing Oracle E-Business Suite infrastructure. Specifically, the company desired a solution that allowed TPC Consultants in the field to accept mobile payments at their popular “Cooking Shows”. Given the requirements, CardConnect conceptualized and designed the first mobile-to-ERP payments solution without modifying TPC’s existing Oracle E-Business environment.

In home cooking shows: 

The Pampered Chef uses the party plan model as their main selling method, and the overwhelming majority of their sales occur at in-home “Cooking Shows”. At these private parties organized by Pampered Chef consultants, guests prepare a recipe using TPC products and then have the opportunity to purchase these products—and anything else in the Pampered Chef catalog—at a partyexclusive discount.

Designing the payment acceptance platform for the in-home Cooking Shows proved complicated. The time between the Cooking Shows and the time the orders were finalized and the products delivered could span 3-4 weeks. A card transaction receives a higher interchange rate when you authorize a card and wait more than two weeks to capture and settle. In order to avoid the high interchange fees associated with violating the authorization– capture/settlement window, CardConnect had to find a way to securely collect payment information without authorizing the card. After deliberation by CardConnect payment and technology experts with consultation by the PCI Council and Trustwave, CardConnect’s PCI compliance partner, a solution CardConnect identifies as a “store-andforward” process was conceptualized.

The Problem: 

The original payment acceptance process for purchases made at these in-home cooking shows was very disjointed. When the show was winding down, Pampered Chef consultants would write down customers’ orders, including their credit card information (a PCI Compliance no-no!). The consultant would later type these orders into TPC sales software on their at- home computers. This software was not integrated with Oracle EBusiness, which meant these orders had to be replicated in Oracle by TPC’s finance department.

1. When the Cooking Show is winding down, TPC consultants will use mobile secure card readers to accept payment for orders placed. When cards are swiped, authentication data is captured, encrypted, tokenized, and stored at CardConnect’s PCI compliant data center.
2. Over the following 2-3 weeks guests can call in and adjust their orders. When the consultant closes the show, the track data will be passed to the processor for authorization, capture, and settlement.
3. CardConnect will run a settlement-capture process 4 times daily that will take the settlement file from the processor and feed it into Oracle. Through CardConnect’s solution, Oracle will then be able to automatically reconcile all matched settlement files, leaving only those that require investigation marked with a red flag.

The CardConnect Solution: Store-and-Forward

Benefits of Store-and-Forward

1. Card-present rates: Card-present rates typically are 30 basis points less than card-not-present transactions. In its previous process, the consultant would key-in the transactions and all transactions would receive card-not-present rates. Since the new process will allow consultants to physically swipe the card at the end of the party, cardpresent rates will be in effect.
2. It minimizes the authorization/capture window: With most mobile payment providers, you would authorize or pre-authorize the card the night of the party. Later, when the orders were finalized and the amount was captured (often 3-4 weeks after), the transactions would fall out of the 14 day capture window and the transaction would downgrade to a worse rate.
3. It keeps card data safe: Because the authentication data is stored at CardConnect’s PCI-compliant data center, The Pampered Chef and its Oracle ERP stay completely out of PCI scope.

If this sounds like a solution for your business contact us!

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