While swipe cards have been an industry buzz word for years, there has never been an effective or viable solution for using membership cards to process barter transactions…Until now.

Swipe Cards? You Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Swipe Cards

2D Bar Codes are the next generation of bar coding and Barter21 software has taken advantage of this technology along with the technology of Android and iPhones. Barter21 now has a true mobile application that allows exchange owners, brokers, and members to view and search the directory, view and purchase from the Trading Floor, review account balances, and post transactions using a membership card with a 2D bar code. No swipe cards needed!

BCL Soft researched the swipe card feature for Barter21 software since our launch 19 months ago. And we always came to the same conclusion – the cost is prohibitive and not every business in your exchange has a swipe box for their merchant account. And most businesses don’t want to change merchant processors or cannot add programming to their swipe box. Plus those additional swipe fees can really add up.

With so few exchange members that have actual credit card swipe boxes and with the expense of supplying members with swipe card readers for your members, BCL Soft looked for a better and more universal way to read a membership card to process transactions.

Mobile Apps and QR Codes

BCL Soft has incorporated a type of 2D bar code known as a QR Code into our true mobile app – the first mobile app in the barter software industry. A QR code can be printed on anything from a membership card to a simple business card or a gift certificate. A QR code can even be sent via email and you can read it right on your computer screen.

Barter21′s new mobile app allows your members to download a program to their Android device or iPhone*. With this application (app) your member can log in to the app, scan the buyer’s membership card, and process the transaction. It’s easier than taking picture with your phone.

Questions or comments? Please call us at 623-242-2537 or info@bclsoft.com. We’ll be back in the office on Monday, November 1.

We hope you are as excited about this feature as we are. We’re the only barter software on the market with these amazing new features.

Barry Cohen
Catherine Cohen
Luther Monson

In his book “The Science of Getting Rich, ” Wallace D. Wattles instructs us to “pass from the competitive mind to the creative mind.” But what does that mean?

The barter business, like most businesses can get very competitive. Instead, in whatever business you’re in, try to be creative instead of competitive.

As a software provider, BCL Soft, along with professional associations such as IRTA (the International Reciprocal Trade Association), part of our job is to present information about barter to businesses. Through blogs, videos and other social media BCL Soft makes your job of explaining what barter is all about easier for you. We need to become creative in order to help promote a universal message – barter is good for business.

When you service your customers, bring them more information (knowledge is power) and help them increase their profits, you increase your profits. And you make things better for your entire industry. That’s what BCL Soft always strives to do.

Unfortunately, many business owners never move “from the competitive to the creative mind.” When your business becomes creative it becomes successful. Be glad in your success and be glad in the success of others. When exchanges do well and publicize it, that brings up all the exchanges and the barter industry as a whole.

Sadly, there are still businesses out there, in barter and in all industries, that think the best way to get ahead is to accuse their competition. “When in doubt, create false accusations,” seems to be their motto.

Work with your barter software provider, your professional organization (IRTA or NATE) and other exchanges to present positive messages about our great industry. And when someone else is doing well, don’t accuse them of being unethical or unprofessional if they aren’t. (That makes you look unprofessional.) Instead, look at what makes them a success and then mimic and improve on it. That’s what Barter21 is all about. That is how the creative mind succeeds.

Barter21 has also recently updated and re-released their software user manual.

Next on the development list, according to Barry Cohen, includes a revamping of the commission system.

Software, any software, is created for you to license or subscribe to in order to use. Bill Gates doesn’t require that every letter you print and mail have “Created by Microsoft” in the header and footer of the page. Then why should the software you use to run YOUR business have another company’s name in the forefront?

If your barter exchange is a franchise, then of course, the identity is the franchise’s, not yours. You paid good money to be aligned with a certain already created brand.

But when you are running an independent barter exchange, the brand identity throughout the website should be all about your company, not the software. For example, one software encourages you to change your company name so that the name of their software is in your name.

Another barter exchange management software has about 2 inches of space at the bottom of every page of your website talking about himself, his company, and how wonderful that software is. There is even a poetic quote on your company’s website attributed to the programmer’s mother. Really? And to add insult to injury, emails from the system go out with not your company’s name but the name of the software instead.

But as much as I dislike those two, I have to say there is a worse thief of your brand’s identity out there. A lesser known software allows absolutely nothing on the landing page of it’s users. I typed in the www. of a well known barter exchange only to land on a page that was blank except for a login form in the middle of the page, a logo at the top corner, and a couple of menu items. At the top a contact button brings up some contact information about the exchange. But when you click on the home button, guess where you go? NOT to the home page of the barter exchange paying good money to use this software. No, you are directed to the home page of the software.

Not every software out their puts their brand identity before yours. Barter21 is an excellent example but there are others. The problem as I see it is that so many exchanges are using the software that make them – the exchanges, second and the software first. When I Google exchanges I find that their online description devotes much to the software they are using and nothing to the exchange itself. Most barter platforms even put their own brand in the title bar of every page on your website.

As a barter exchange you need to develop your own brand and cultivate that identity. Software is just something you use. It is a tool to run the exchange. It should never be the identity of your exchange. So if your software is hogging up the entire spotlight and taking away from the brand of your exchange, you may want to look at other options. And here’s my plug – Barter21 puts your brand at the forefront. We have just a small logo at the very bottom of the page.

As a provider of barter exchange software, BCL Soft’s Barter21 processes the 1099-B’s for our member exchanges. Not all providers do this, and if they do it is typically done wrong.

This is our first year in business and we knew we needed to set up our process right from the start. We thought the way the other barter exchange management software providers submitted 1099-B information was fine. After all they had been doing it for years. But when we did our research we found the information other software providers sent to the IRS was incomplete or just wrong. What does that mean for your exchange? It means your exchange could be flagged be the IRS. And if you are audited it could mean heavy fines for you.

Here are some things that U.S. based barter exchange owners need to know:

• If your barter exchange had a total of less than 100 transactions in the year, you are not required to report to the IRS - although it is a good idea to do it anyway.
  
• If a member of the exchange did a minimum of $1.00 in barter transactions, you must report the sale(s) on form 1099-B.
• All business entities must receive and report 1099-B’s. Sole proprietors, LLCs, and corporations. No exceptions.
• Corporations and LLCs get a single aggregate total 1099-B for the year.
• Sole proprietors are required to get one 1099-B for each and every transaction.
• The due date for furnishing statements to barter exchange members is February 15.

The question all barter exchange owners and members must ask themselves is this – Are my earnings being properly reported to the IRS? If not, why not? The last thing any of us want to do is throw up red flags to the IRS. Check with your software provider. Find out if they have been following the rules or making up their own rules. If they make up their own rules – it is your exchange that will pay the fines to the IRS, not your software provider.

Form 1099-B is very different from a standard 1099. Don’t take my word for it. Visit the IRS website and discover all the requirements for barter exchanges. http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=188094,00.html. Pay close attention to the Penalties section.

With all of the research we did, I have to give some credit to people for helping us along the way:

• Ron Whitney of the International Reciprocal Trade Association – www.irta.com – for answering simple and complex questions, and settling an argument or two.
• Kathleen R. Lindquist, CPA – www.kathleenrlindquistcpa.com – CPA extraordinaire.
• Scott Cain of Evergreen Exchange – www.evergreenexchange.com – Thanks for reminding me of the 100 transaction rule!

Reference document http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/i1099b_09.pdf

Happy Bartering!