The Dots Blog

The Ultimate Guide to Merchant Accounts Navigating the complex world of financial transactions in the business landscape requires a fundamental understanding of merchant accounts. As a business owner, having a reliable and secure means to accept payments is paramount to success. In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore the intricacies of merchant accounts, from their definition and types to providers, functionality, benefits, associated fees, and tips for choosing the right provider for your

How to Lower Your Credit Card Processing Fees Managing expenses is a key factor in ensuring your company’s profitability. One area where businesses can make a significant impact on their bottom line is credit card processing fees. High processing fees can eat into profits, making it crucial for businesses to explore strategies to lower these costs. In this comprehensive guide, we'll delve into effective methods to reduce credit card processing fees, covering negotiation tactics with payment pro

Protecting Your Finances: Best Practices for Securing Credit Card Transactions Whether swiping, inserting, or tapping, credit card processing is the backbone of modern commerce. However, this convenience comes with a significant responsibility — the need to secure your credit card transactions. In this comprehensive guide, we'll delve into the nuances of credit card processing, the importance of security, associated risks, and practical tips to ensure your transactions remain safe. Get Started

Steps for Automating Your Accounting Process Efficiency in accounting is paramount for the smooth functioning of any business. Automation has emerged as a game-changer, allowing organizations to streamline their financial processes and allocate resources more strategically. In this comprehensive guide, we will explore the steps involved in automating your accounting process, the benefits of embracing automation, criteria for selecting the right accounting software, integration considerations wi

The Benefits of Automated Payouts Over Manual Processes The adoption of automated processes has become a cornerstone of efficiency and accuracy. Automated payouts, in particular, have emerged as a transformative solution, replacing traditional manual processes with streamlined, secure, and efficient systems. In this blog, we'll explore the inherent risks associated with manual payout processes, including human error, fraud, reduced efficiency, and security issues. We'll also delve into the nume

How Automated Payouts Affect Employee Retention and Happiness The way employees are compensated plays a pivotal role in their overall satisfaction and retention. Traditional payout methods, characterized by manual processes and delayed transactions, have often fallen short in meeting the expectations of modern employees. This blog explores how the adoption of automated payout systems can positively impact employee retention and happiness by addressing the disadvantages of traditional methods an

Credit Card Processing Rules and Regulations: What to Know Understanding credit card processing rules and regulations is crucial for businesses that handle payment transactions. Compliance with these standards not only ensures a secure and trustworthy payment environment for customers but also protects businesses from legal repercussions. In this blog post, we'll provide an overview of the key credit card processing rules and regulations, covering essential aspects such as PCI DSS, GDPR, AML, K

Form 1099-K: A Comprehensive Guide These days, people are finding unique ways to make money. Thanks to technology, opening up a business from home or making extra money as a side hustle is easier than ever. The gig economy is booming and shows no signs of slowing down. As a result, more people earn an income outside standard nine-to-five jobs. While that benefits individuals and small businesses, it can create confusion when tax season rolls around. If you're a small business owner or part of

Automation continues to change nearly every industry. As technology improves and organizations invest in digital transformation, businesses of all sizes are finding new ways to make standard operations more efficient than before. When most people think of automation, they picture high-tech machines simplifying industrial workflows. However, automation software can be a game-changer for many modern businesses both online and offline. The best example is a payments automation platform. Your compa

Navigating the complex world of financial transactions in the business landscape requires a fundamental understanding of merchant accounts. As a business owner, having a reliable and secure means to accept payments is paramount to success. In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore the intricacies of merchant accounts, from their definition and types to providers, functionality, benefits, associated fees, and tips for choosing the right provider for your business. Get Started with Dots Today

Businesses have a mountain of paperwork to file when preparing their taxes. While employee tax obligations are relatively straightforward, what if you work with freelancers and independent contractors? Self-employed individuals aren't full-time staff employees, so they're exempt from income tax withholding. Because you're not their official employer, you don't have to pay for Medicare and the Social Security Administration taxes. Contractors take care of that with self-employment taxes. But jus

Independent contractors have a lot to offer businesses, big and small. They can help companies meet long- and short-term goals while giving organizations a cost-effective solution for bringing in new talent. More and more businesses are turning to contractors to fulfill roles they may not need on a full-time employee basis. For example, contractors often work on specific projects or cover seasonal staffing issues. With independent contractors around the world offering their skills, it's also a

Modern banking is more efficient and versatile than ever before. These days, you have numerous options for sending and receiving money. With a payouts API like Dots, you're no longer limited to just one rail when you need to send payments to contractors, marketplace sellers, affiliates, etc. While traditional debit cards and mobile payment services are widely used, electronic money transfer protocols reign supreme. Businesses looking to pay contractors often choose to make ACH or RTP payments.

If you’re a business that employs freelancers and independent contractors, it’s essential to stay tax compliant. Improperly classifying employees or failing to file the correct tax documents can lead to hefty fines and penalties. To stay compliant, you need to understand your obligations as an employer and ensure you’re following the relevant state and federal laws for 1099 workers. In this blog post, we’ll provide you with a guide to staying tax compliant when paying your contractors. If you’r

If you’re an e-commerce business, it makes sense to make the checkout process as simple and seamless as possible for your customers. This means making the process intuitive, but it also means offering multiple payment gateways. Online businesses can benefit from multiple payment options in numerous ways. Whether you want to improve the customer experience or increase revenue, multiple payment options may be your solution. In this blog post, we’ll be taking a closer look at these benefits and tal

There are more digital payment methods available to consumers than ever. If you’re an online business owner, it benefits you to offer multiple payment methods to your customers. It gives them more flexibility and options with how they pay, creating less friction in the checkout process. Less friction means more conversions and more revenue and for you. While it can sometimes be complex to implement these payment methods into your current payment infrastructure, the positive impact is worth the e

Online fraud is a major challenge for e-commerce businesses. It can cost you money and put your customers’ sensitive data at risk. E-commerce businesses owners need to be proactive to prevent online frauds and take the necessary precautions to protect their customers. In this blog, we’ll be diving into the different types of online fraud and how you can reduce your risk. Read on to learn more or click below to schedule a demo with the Dots payment API. Book a Demo with Dots Common Tactics Sc

E-commerce business owners can increase sales and conversions with a streamlined and versatile payment process. If you’re looking to improve your payment processes for your business, this guide can help. In this ultimate guide to e-commerce payment processing, we’ll give you all the information you need to improve your payment infrastructure. We’ll be going over the different types of payment processing, security, international payments, the most popular payment processors and more. By the end o

Are you a business that needs to onboard 1099 contractors? This can be a tricky process, but it doesn’t have to be that way. In this blog, we’ll provide you with a step-by-step guide on how to successfully onboard 1099 contractors as efficiently and effectively as possible. Onboarding requires proper compliance, understanding of 1099 contractors and more, but we’ll cover everything you need to know. Ready to learn more? Read on or schedule a demo with Dots to automate compliance and tax reporti

If you’ve transferred money internationally, you may have heard of IBANs. IBANs, or International Bank Account Numbers, are used worldwide for international and sometimes domestic transactions. But what exactly are these numbers and how do they work? In this post, we’ll be discussing everything you need to know about IBANs. Read on to learn more or schedule a demo with Dots to learn how you can improve your international payout process. Book a Demo with Dots A Quick Overview An IBAN (Intern

With Dots, processing payments is 2 to 3 times quicker than with Stripe. This task used to take half of a day when I was using Stripe, and now it normally takes about an hour each day. It’s a meaningful change for us to reclaim that bandwidth. Zach Schmid, Head of Operations, TeachMe.To TeachMe.To is a rapidly growing coaching marketplace that matches students with their perfect coach. TeachMe.To provides their instructors with a business-in-a-box solution, providing access to customer

The world has drastically shifted toward digital payments over the last decades. As the years have passed, digital payment technology has only become more flexible, secure, and cost-effective. This shift has made it much easier for businesses of all sizes to go global, accepting payments from all around the world and scaling like never before. Some of the benefits of digital global payments are immediately obvious – they allow companies to reach more customers. Some of the benefits are more sub

If you’re an e-commerce business owner, you need to know about Form 1099-MISC. More importantly, you also need to be aware of the differences between 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC. While you may have used 1099-MISC in the past for certain payouts, you’ll likely need to file 1099-NEC forms instead depending on your business. Taxes can be complicated and dealing with these forms is never an enjoyable process, but it’s important to understand how to file these properly. We’ve put together an ultimate gui

Organizing a video game tournament is already a time-consuming and resource-intensive task. There are anti-cheat measures to consider, roster management, and much more. But perhaps one of the most difficult factors to manage is distributing eSports prize payments. Handling entry fees and payouts for entrants is an essential part of the process, but it can become complex quickly. It’s a lot of responsibility for an organizer to handle these payouts and it can quickly become overwhelming.There ar

Thanks to the internet, it’s easier than ever to broaden your business horizons and operate on a more global scale. The days of being limited to independent contractors and freelancers in your area are over. Collaborators with the specific skills and unique perspectives you want are only a few clicks away. But one obstacle still prevents many companies from tapping into the international workforce: processing payments. Paying international contractors can get complicated faster than it takes for

Business owners must consider what payment systems they accept or use during the course of regular business. One consideration that sometimes goes unaddressed is the difference between closed and open-loop payment systems. The distinction seems fairly straightforward, but there are nuances to consider for each. In this blog post, we'll explore what sets open-loop and closed-loop payment systems apart and how each one works. We'll also discuss the benefits and drawbacks of both, so you can make

Business owners need to pay freelancers and independent contractors differently than they pay their employees. Creating a separate process for paying non-employees can be a hassle, especially if you work with a lot of contractors. Fortunately, it doesn’t have to be complicated. Dots provides a hassle-free and frictionless way to pay out your independent contractors and freelancers, no matter where they are. Wondering what ways there are to pay these non-employees? You have several options, with

Independent contractors and freelancers can be a useful source of work for employers. They can help your business pick up the slack in certain areas or they can bring unique expertise without having to create a new department. Of course, it’s important to remain compliant when your business utilizes 1099 workers. In this guide, we’ll walk you through what makes a 1099 worker, how to remain compliant, and more. Book a Demo with Dots What is a 1099 Worker? A 1099 worker is an independent cont

Starting out, our biggest limitation was what we were previously using–Stripe Connect. We kept running into roadblock after roadblock. Initially, it was fine, as we were just using it for basic use cases, but once we needed more flexibility, that's when we were banging our heads against the wall. Since integrating with Dots, we've been able to increase our signup rates exponentially. More specifically, Dots integration has increased our creator signup conversion rate by 31% for a few reason

What is the INFORM Consumer Act? The INFORM Consumer Act, which stands for Integrity, Notification, and Fairness in Online Retail Marketplaces for Consumers, was passed December 29, 2022 as an addendum to the Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2023 bill. This new act applies to online marketplaces defined as any business that conforms to “consumer-directed” platforms that “facilitate or enable third party sellers to engage in the sale, purchase, payment, storage, shipping, or delivery of a cons

Every business can benefit from streamlining its payment infrastructure. However, restructuring your payment processes and workflows can be difficult and time-consuming. But it doesn’t have to be that way. With the Dots API, you can make your payment processes more efficient and save time while also making sure your payout infrastructure is more secure and reliable. Not only can businesses reap huge rewards by streamlining financial transactions, but it can also greatly simplify your customer an

One of the best ways to streamline your payout ecosystem is with a digital wallet. Instead of transferring money to a payee’s bank account, you can send their funds directly to their digital wallet on your platform. This keeps funds in your system until users’ funds reach a certain amount or they decide what they want to do with them. Not only does this put more power in your users’ hands with how they use their payments, but they also get access to their money much faster. Digital wallets offer

Since implementing Dots, just about everything–time, speed, user interface–is better. At every turn, we were disappointed with Stripe’s performance, especially regarding speed. It was so slow for us that mailing a physical paper check to the customer was faster than the time it took for them to payout on their ACH transactions. Our customers would also get frequent account holds as most of our customers don't have websites or an online presence so Stripe’s automatic verification system just w

A Brief Overview Many employers have international workforces, allowing them to get skilled employees from around the globe. Not only does this open up the talent pool, but it can also help you enter new markets and grow your business. W-8BEN Forms are a critical part of hiring foreign employees and contractors. These forms are important to make sure their country of residence is certified and in line with tax regulations. It’s important for both employers and employees to have their taxes pro

An Overview Banking is much faster and more efficient in the modern era. Rather than dealing with cash transactions or transactions through checks and cards, you can now transfer money electronically through ACH, also known as the Automated Clearing House The ACH network has been in operation for decades now, and it’s easily one of the safest and most convenient methods of transferring money. The ACH network can also be used internationally, making it easy to transfer money worldwide, all with

An Overview Technology has made it much easier for individuals and businesses to exchange funds. Sending money online is more convenient and affordable than ever, with various methods to do so. Some of the most common methods are ACH payments and wire transfers. While the two methods seem similar, they do have multiple differences. Both methods allow you to send money directly from a bank account, but the method, cost, speed, and availability differ. In today’s guide, we’ll walk you through th

Implementing a Good Strategy Online marketplaces are a multibillion-dollar industry, with many businesses getting their piece of the pie. However, to get the biggest share possible you need to have the right monetization strategy in place. The question is, which monetization strategy should you use? The common strategies all have their pros and cons, and there is no “right” answer. The answer will depend on your user base, your industry and what the marketplace is used for. In this blog, we’ll

The biggest value for us has been organization and time. We've really been able to streamline the service and easily manage our high frequency of low volume transactions. We have a lot of coaches, who are our contractors and used Venmo to pay them out previously, which was free, but inconvenient to keep track of all their handles. And when some people didn't have Venmo, we needed to use CashApp, and when some people didn't have either, I needed to resort to something else. But Dots brought ev

An Overview Many businesses outsource tasks to freelancers and contractors. This can help organizations get more work done and save money for specialized tasks that don’t require full-time employees. However, just because they don’t work at your company doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be paid in a timely manner. Some organizations will try to pay contractors in a way that is beneficial for their cash flow and accounts payable, but this often hurts contractors. You have to consider the way contract

An Overview Accepting payments is essential for any business and with globalization more widespread than ever, accepting international payments is becoming just as important. However, there are numerous different methods for sending and receiving global payments. These methods each come with their own set of pros and cons, and the right method often depends on the situation. If you’re a business that sends or receives international payments, you need to decide which payment methods to offer. W

Security Is Our Top Priority The Dots payouts API makes it easy to send and receive payments on numerous payment platforms. Privacy and data security are top priorities for any business. With Dots, you can trust that our API makes sure customer and contractor data is safe, protected and compliant with the highest security and privacy standards. Learn more about the Dots API and how we protect the privacy of our users. Get Started with Dots Today A Brief Overview First, a brief overview of

Before Dots, we used a combination of different services – ACH transfers, a lot of Venmo and Cash App. Cash App was important for us, because we're trying to meet our contractors, delivery drivers, where they are and Cash App is the method of payment that many of them are used to. Transaction fees, in that case, were not insignificant with 3% per transaction at a minimum and it required a lot of time and energy to manually manage payments, largely on phones by relying on one or two different

Instant Bank Transfers with RTP Dots now supports and defaults to instant bank transfers over the Real Time Payments rail wherever possible. RTP is supported by most large financial institutions and has coverage over a majority of bank accounts. Instant bank transfers over RTP will be automatic for a payee once we have their SSN, Date of Birth, and address on file. ID Verification with Persona After many requests, we've added ID verification through Persona as an optional flow step that yo

An Overview A few decades ago, the concept of influencer marketing was nonexistent. The closest thing we had to influencers before the mid-2000s was movie stars and musical artists, and getting their endorsements wasn’t cheap. That all changed when social media blew up. Now, popular content creators are getting the attention of millions of adoring fans worldwide — just by being themselves and producing easy-to-digest content on social media! There’s something inherently down-to-earth about peop

Dots API V2 Our API recently turned a year old and in the past 12 months we have received a lot of great feedback from our customers. After a few months of design and development, we are happy to release V2 of the Dots API. V2 improvements focus on improving the user creation and connection process, introducing transfers, and standardizing our endpoints. Read the Docs User Creation Improvements In V1 of the API, we would return a verification_id when the user was first created. This id c

Managing Your Payments Are there people outside of the United States you need to pay? With increasing numbers of companies working with global partners and contractors, international payments are more common than most realize. While there are many ways to perform these transactions, one of the most common methods is to do a wire transfer. Wire transfers let you move money from one bank to the next without taking out cash or writing a check. They’re pretty efficient when done domestically, but w

Streamline Your Payments Thanks to the internet, it’s easier than ever to broaden your business horizons and operate on a more global scale. The days of being limited to independent contractors and freelancers in your area are over. Collaborators with the specific skills and unique perspectives you want are only a few clicks away. But one obstacle still prevents many companies from tapping into the international workforce: processing payments. Paying international contractors can get complicat

Before Dots, we had to pay a lump sum to every producer and make sure they would would divvy the comedians' payouts on their end. The process was super manual, untrackable and made collecting 1099 information really hard. Dots let us give money to comedians directly. We love Dots so much we're trying to add it to more stuff! They're incredibly responsive and add requested features quickly. Brett Kushner, Don't Tell Comedy COO Don't Tell Comedy has built a network of independent comedy

Flows Save months of development time by implementing Dots Flows. Flows handle complex tasks like onboarding, collecting tax information and saving payout information. Flows consist of various steps that can be chained together to create your desired flow. For example, onboard users by having them them fill out their SSN, address and date of birth, then have them connect their bank account through Plaid. Once onboarded, payouts can be made through the API or pre-authenticated flows with just t

Custom Logo Support Payout Links and Payout iFrames can now be customized with your logo which can be uploaded on the Settings page. More customization options will be added in over the coming weeks. Fixes and Improvements * Fixed the dropdown button on all tables * Added EIN formatting validation to request access flow * Enabled RTP for certain payouts * Added tracking for RTP and certain ACH transfers * Improved sign up flow for existing users * Added multi-application support * I

Payee Dashboard We're launching a new payee dashboard at my.dots.dev. Currently this new dashboard allows all of Dots' payees to view their transactions histories and create Payout Requests as detailed below. Soon, this dashboard will also allow the management of a payee's connected accounts and other profile settings. Payout Requests Payout Requests allow you to send a dedicated link to your contractors, employees and even interns allowing them to submit a request for payment. This can be

💵Dots was part of the YC S21 batch. We built a developer-friendly API that lets businesses pay their contractors through just a few lines of code. Dots' manages the entire process: information collection (KYC), payments through any rail (ACH, Venmo, CashApp, Zelle, international, and many more to come), and even filing tax forms. Earlier this week, news broke of a Y Combinator letter sent out to all founders of YC companies. The contents of the letter went on to spark some debate on how much Y

Dots is excited to announce our new and improved Dashboard! While we push new features into production at Dots near daily, delighting our customers is truly our core KPI. So we've rolled out some highly requested features, all with a more beautiful experience. 📈Dashboard Features: - Insights into your payouts - Direct views into User and Transaction Data - Manual Payout Generator - API key and App Setting management - more to come :) Insights Our dashboard lets Dots' customers get valuable

The new Payout Links feature allows for payment between two parties with just a few clicks and no code necessary. Simply exchange a link and you can enable payout quickly and seamlessly. This link can be generated through the Dots API or through a dashboard. Payments can be sent and received using Dots’ integrated ledger and wallet system. Customers can choose to send or withdraw funds in a multitude of ways (payouts to Venmo, Paypal, CashApp, and many more), easily accessible from the Dots App

Implementing Dots even allowed our product to grow over 100% month over month!