Gamma targets small firms with PCI payment security

Gamma has outlined a sales push for PCI payment security tools aimed at small and medium-sized businesses that take card payments by phone, arguing the market extends far beyond large insurers and financial groups.

In a podcast discussion, Gamma executives made the case for tighter controls around telephone payments. They argued that smaller firms are often exposed to fraud, chargebacks and compliance risks without fully recognising the issue as PCI-related.

Andy Herring, Commercial and Strategy Product Manager at Gamma, and Ed Savory, Channel Head for the South East at Gamma, focused much of the discussion on the impact on small businesses rather than the large corporates that have traditionally dominated compliance conversations.

Savory cited UK card fraud losses of more than GBP £572 million and said the direct effect on smaller merchants can be severe when disputed transactions lead to chargebacks.

“Chargebacks happen when a transaction is questioned by the cardholder, whether because of suspected fraud or because they believe they were charged the wrong amount,” Savory said. “That starts a process that usually ends with the customer seeking a refund. For a small business, a few chargebacks a month can have a significant impact. The average cost is between sixty pounds and sixty-five pounds per chargeback, and that is before you add the time spent dealing with queries, complaints, banks and providers. It quickly becomes a major issue for small businesses.”

Herring said customer discussions often need to move away from fear of fines and towards the immediate commercial effects of taking card details incorrectly over the phone. He added that one of the sharpest risks for a small firm is the possibility of losing access to merchant services if it fails to comply.

According to the executives, any business that accepts credit card payments by phone could fall within scope, regardless of size. They pointed to sectors including retail, hospitality, automotive services, florists, takeaways, garages, dentists and skip hire firms as examples of businesses that may still rely on informal payment handling.

Broad market

Savory said many firms still ask customers to read card numbers aloud, repeat them back or trust staff not to write them down. He argued that such habits remain common across the high street and in service businesses despite the risks.

He added that the impact of chargebacks and related costs can be greater for a small florist with two or three staff than for a large corporation.

That point underpins Gamma’s pitch to channel partners. Rather than treating PCI as a specialist issue limited to heavily regulated sectors, the company wants resellers to see it as a broader cross-sell opportunity within their existing unified communications customer base.

Herring said businesses that already buy communications services may be easier to approach on payment security because the supplier relationship is already in place. Savory added that this can help partners present themselves as trusted advisers rather than focusing only on price or contract renewal.

Product detail

The pair also described how Gamma’s iPECS-based PCI offer is structured. Herring said the company uses a per-user monthly pricing model, in contrast to rival offers that can include setup charges running into four figures as well as transaction fees.

He also described a LinkPay option for customers that prefer to send a payment link by SMS, email or WhatsApp instead of taking card details verbally during a call. The option is aimed at businesses such as builders’ merchants and garages, where payment may be made after a booking or service call.

For live telephone payments, Herring said the system uses a dedicated PCI trunk and a four-digit code to start a secure transaction. Keypad tones are stripped from the call data so they do not appear in recordings, while the agent sees only limited masked card information through a portal.

That matters for businesses that need to record calls for compliance or operational reasons. Herring said the system also injects silence into the call while card numbers are entered, preventing spoken digits from being captured if a customer reads them out from habit.

Savory said the system works with major payment service providers in the UK. Herring put the current total at thirteen or fourteen and said additional providers can be added where needed.

The two men repeatedly returned to the economics for smaller firms, framing the offer as a fixed monthly cost against the unpredictable cost of disputed payments and internal admin time. Savory said businesses across the high street, from florists and hairdressers to dentists, need services like this. He described it as a form of insurance that helps protect against chargebacks and fraud, supports compliance and reduces risk for a manageable fixed fee.