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When a customer purchases products from your site with a credit card, you or your site software will request approval that the card is valid and that sufficient funds are available in the customers account for the purchase. On approval, the bank will reply with an authorization number and the order will be officially "captured".
In the next step, the merchandise or service is sent to the customer and the Merchant informs the bank where the Merchant Account is held. The bank then deposits funds into the Merchant Account as the customers account is debited the cost of the products. The bank of your Merchant Account will remove the necessary service fees and complete the transaction.
Offline processing lands some labor on the part of the Merchant, but is simplest to adapt an existing business. In this case, a businesses current credit card processor will answer.
Real-time processing requires little or no involvement by the Merchant, and is ideal for businesses in need of processing hundreds of orders per month. Credit Card numbers are received through the Internet and cleared by CyberCash online processing.