Collecting a signature for a payment is pretty straight forward, right? You print a receipt, the customer signs it, you file the signed receipt and you’re done. Sure this works, but there are so many downsides to collecting signatures on paper receipts, including chargebacks, costs and damage to the environment.
To minimize these negative side effects, we created signature capture:
5 Benefits of Signature Capture
- Eliminate the chance of chargebacks. The best defense against a chargeback is a signature verifying the purchase. Though paper receipts feature signatures, they often fade, get damaged or lost. This renders paper receipts useless when faced with three types of chargebacks: bank-initiated, customer-initiated and friendly chargebacks.
- Cut costs of paper receipt resources. Regularly printing paper receipts comes with a significant cost; you need to purchase a printer, keep stock of paper rolls and printer ink and maintain storage space. If you’re a large business, storing receipts may require a courier service to pick up and drop off receipts. With signature capture, all of these costs are eliminated.
- Reduce your environmental footprint. Paper receipts cannot be recycled because they are printed on thermal paper, adding to the already overwhelming amount of non-recyclable waste on our planet. Producing paper receipts also requires large amounts of natural resources. One year of production uses 1 billion gallons of water, 150 million gallons of oil and 10 million trees in the U.S. alone.
- Align with your customers’ preferences. The Virtual Terminal gives customers the option to email or print receipts. Did you know 90 percent of individuals prefer digitally stored receipts (e.g., Gmail) over paper receipts? Instead of always printing a customer copy, signature capture allows you to simply email them a digital copy of their receipt.
- Build an email marketing list. Signature capture lets you build a list of contacts. Whether they’re one-time or repeat customers, keep them engaged about promotions, sales, new products or industry news. This will drive sales and customer loyalty.
Signature capture benefits your business, your customers and the environment. Go paperless, streamline checkout and satisfy your customers — all with one simple solution.
Are you trying to go paperless? Do you think signature capture would change your business for the better? Let us know below!
Editor's Note: This post was originally published in February 2017 and has been updated for comprehensiveness and accuracy.