XCharge Review

We are currently able to locate over 10 XCharge complaints, none of which describe the company as a scam or a ripoff. Common themes among complainants include equipment issues, poor customer service, and undisclosed fees. The company has seen a moderate uptick in complaints over our last few updates, which indicates that it may be growing very rapidly or may have made an unfavorable alteration to its contract terms in that time.

A handful of complainants mention that they only use XCharge because it is the payment processing partner for Mitchell 1, a business management product for the automotive repair industry. At this time, we are able to locate complaints that mention XCharge, Accelerated Payment Technologies, and CAM Commerce, so the company may be conducting business under all three names. XCharge appears to offer dedicated support phone lines on its website, but it is unclear whether these are serviced by Global Payments or by XCharge.

Note: We have adjusted this company’s BBB rating according to our own standards. To better understand why we adjust BBB ratings, please see our Rating Criteria.

As of this review, XCharge is not listed with the Better Business Bureau, though its alternate name, Accelerated Payment Technologies, is listed as “OpenEdge” with the BBB. Accelerated Payment Technologies currently does not have a rating with the BBB and has had 21 complaints filed against it in the last 36 months. Eight of these complaints stemmed from billing or collections issues and 13 from problems with products or services. Of the total complaints, four were successfully resolved. The remaining complaints either were resolved to the dissatisfaction of the merchant or did not receive a final response from the merchant. In light of the company’s complaint rate and resolution ratio, we have adjusted the BBB’s rating to a “B.”

The standard XCharge contract (available below) is a three-year agreement through Global Payments with automatic renewal for one year. The contract includes a Liquidated Damagesearly termination fee, and we have found some merchant complaints that mention an annual PCI Compliance fee of $99. Although this particular copy of the company’s contract does not include the full fee schedule, it is also possible that merchants are subject to application fees, minimum monthly fees, chargeback fees, and service fees.

The contract’s Liquidated Damages early termination fee is figured in an uncommon way. It charges the merchant “the lesser of (a) the maximum amount permitted by state law, and (b) all monthly fees assessed to Merchant under this Card Services Agreement and due to Global Direct for the remainder of the then existing term of the Card Services Agreement, including all minimum monthly fee commitments.” In other words, merchants who cancel service will be on the hook for either the maximum allowable fine under state law or the remaining cost of their contract, depending on which amount is smaller. Regardless of how expensive this may be in practice, it is clear that it bears little relation to the actual loss suffered by the company upon the merchant’s cancellation. At this time, we are only able to locate a couple of merchant complaints about the company’s terms, but it seems that the service can get very costly very quickly for a merchant. See the XCharge Merchant Application.

XCharge rates as an average merchant services provider according to our rating system. The company is showing few complaints online, but its overall rating suffers from the poor contract terms it offers through Global Payments. Merchants should be aware that XCharge, X-Charge, OpenEdge, Accelerated Payment Technologies, and CAM Commerce are all current or former names for this business.