Update on online payments:-Worldpay (RBS Group)

Aha! I've found the answer to my online payments problems. Worldpay are part of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group. They are far less expensive (although the cost per transaction seems a little high at 3.95 per cent.

They take Laser payments which is a definite bonus. Worldpay also provide merchant accounts as part of the package (not surprising I suppose since they are part of the RBS).

They have quoted me €145 setup fee, €25 monthly fee. That's way better than Realex were offering. The downside is I have to wait 28 days for payments to clear.

The upside is that payments are handled on their site (negating the need for me to shell out for a secure cert) and that I can pass any information to their payments page and have it passed back again to my own site which means that I can send course dates through so that I know which date somebody has paid for without having to make each date an individual product. That saves so much work.

Added bonus: Worldpay let you customise their payment page to match your site using CSS.
They offer phone and online support. It doesn't matter if you are a company or a sole trader. I don't have to jump through hoops to set up a merchant account with AIB.

Worldpay Win!! Oh, did I mention that I can accept payments in just about any currency?