>it isn't 'cheap' - you're generally looking at paying a percentage between 3-10% of the credit card invoice, depending on the volume of business, the credit card issuer (different credit card providers have different charges, MC/VISA are the least expensive generally, with AMEX and Diners Club charging the most per transaction) and the broker's fees.
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>My experience is that many banks will provide a clearing service for commercial customers, and their fees are generally lower than the broker firms. In most cases, there's no hardware needed - the bank we use at Weatherhill (First Union) haa a direct-dial credit card clearing system; they provide PC-based software that can import a text file format and output a report format to files, and they were more than happy to provide very complete documentation on the file formats and communications protocols involved. Integrating our in-house OE to their PC-based software package using the import/export capability took less than two hours, with direct communications integration and testing taking considerably more time, and requiring periodic maintenance as protocols changed. For a small volume of credit card business, integration through import/export is probably the most economical approach.
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>Many banks will require that a commercial account be active for some period of time before providing credit card clearing services. Credit card clearing services are expensive, especially for new businesses, and this is one area where shopping the local banks can pay off well - in our case, bank services charges and per transaction charges varied quite a bit.

I guess it depends on your intended usage, volume, programming skills, etc. For me, my usage is small-time and I'd probably use someone else to do a direct secure web server transaction to handle all the details, and of course pay a fee for this. This is what's typically done in web auctions. Probably most banks can't directly handle this arrangement, so the options then seem to come down to:

1) Get a web-service to transact with your own commercial bank acount, as you say, cheaper but requires an extra layer, and if any services will do this.
2) Do your own web/phone/fax transactions with the bank account.
3) Let the web broker service handle the whole thing.

Of course, all 3 options are not available to everyone. For many eBay-types, only #3 is realistic. But no doubt the larger sellers use #1 or #2, and the largest or those such as you with computer skills can do the cheapest, #2. (Not saying necessarily I could not do it, but is it worth my while for selling a few auction lots?)

I'll probably try #3, since it's so simple, and if I feel "violated" by fees too much, look into other ideas. I can always stick with checks, slow and unpleasant as they may be...but there's no doubt accepting credit cards like MC/VISA can help a business grow, so may well be worth a small fee.