How to open a merchant account (E-Commerce) in Panama?

This process has two stages. In Panama there are only two banks which open these types of accounts.

First stage.

The first step is to open a corporate account.
The requirements are:
- Social Pact (Certificate of incorporation or charter of the corporation)
- Certificate of the Public Registry
- Notice of Operations / Commercial License
- Identity Card or Passport and second original identification of the following persons:
Officers of the Corporation
Board of Directors
Shareholders
Directors
Persons authorized as signatories of the account
- References:
• One (1) bank or business reference for each of the signatories of the account, commercial reference for the corporation (if you have more than a year of operation) and of the final(s) shareholder (s), real beneficiary of the account.
• The bank reference should indicate minimum of 3 years with the institution.
• Two (2) commercial references from the customers or suppliers if the company does not have one (1) year of operation.
• Two (2) traceable and verifiable personal references.

- Proof of income: income statement, proof of income, balance sheets, financial statements, contracts, other.
- Submit letterhead of the company's business information, profile account operations, any other information.
- The initial amount of opening is 5,000.00 USD.

Second stage.
After opening the checking account you can apply for a Merchant account.
The requirements are:

• Business Plan: Mission, vision, object, background, stock group. (2-3 pages)
•% Chargeback
• Monthly Sales Volume
• Average Ticket (average amount per transaction)
• URL Reply
• Language of Programming
Photos of the office are also required

There are also several documents provided by the bank which have to be signed by the legal representative of  the company (Application Form preliminary information, service contract, membership application).

Bank fees:
• Rate: 3% - 7%
• Due diligence: 1,500 USD in case of foreign
• Annuity: 1,200 USD (3D Secure)
• Reserve Fund: 10% to 120 days
• Transactional Cost: $ 0.50
• Chargeback: 40 USD

Description and Costs

Development and Configuration of Merchant Account
Integration of payment platform. The platform is a Prestashop, design of the cart, responsive, up to 250 items, content management, social networking, hosting for one year, domain and one hour of training. 3500USD

Cart and Integration with Payment Platform
The service is manageable if the platform used on your website is one of the following: Prestashop, Magento or Opencart. 1200USD

Integration with Payment Platform
The service is manageable if the platform used on your website is one of the following: Prestashop, Magento or OpenCart. The languages include: PHP, Ruby on Rails. 350USD

Please note that the numbers mentioned above dont include our fees.