Actually, unless you have bad credit, getting a Merchant Account in order to take Mastercard, Visa and American Express is not that difficult. It can, however, be daunting trying to find someone who can offer you a merchant account. Most banks and financial institutions do not offer their small business customers merchant accounts for “mail order” or “on-line” sales because they consider these high risk. You can find many companies offering this service but it is often expensive or complicated to setup. Also, there are unfortunately some “fly by night” operations that only stay in business long enough to take your substantial deposits.