About the practice.
The practice operates as a specialist boutique payment processor built on direct relationships with nine sponsor banking partners in the United States, alongside a separate set of partners for Canada (with one bank serving both markets). Across 19 years of merchant services and payment solutions experience and approximately 11 years operating under the Fair Merchant Solutions name, the practice has processed close to $3 billion in client transactions. Annual client attrition runs below 1 per cent. Clients stay 6 to 18 years on average. We approve 99 per cent of the merchant applications we submit.
From ACCOR Hotels to $3 Billion.
Eric Douay built this practice to solve a problem the aggregator industry is structurally incapable of solving: how to give a high-volume merchant a payment infrastructure that cannot be algorithmically terminated.
Eric spent the first 17 years of his career inside the international travel and hospitality industry. He opened the first Canadian sales and marketing office for ACCOR Hotels on a mandate engineered from the Paris headquarters, then founded D-TOUR Marketing Inc., the longest-standing Canadian sales and marketing representative for Concorde Hotels & Resorts, Relais & Châteaux, and Grupo Hotelero Gran Caribe.
The hospitality industry taught Eric the discipline of five-star service for B2B clients, a standard he then transposed onto merchant services, transforming what is otherwise a commoditized industry into a specialty boutique practice.
In 2007, Eric began representing payment processors with a particular focus on the travel distribution network. He watched retail and wholesale travel operators lose access to processing during their busiest seasons because the algorithms running aggregator platforms could not understand their business. He started building a different option: real merchant accounts, direct banking relationships, and a person on the other end of the phone who understood the industry. 19 years later, that thesis has not changed.
Two brands. One umbrella. One principal.
Eric serves merchants across two industry worlds. Each world requires a slightly different specialist conversation. So today, the practice is delivered through two operating brands beneath the same umbrella, both run by Eric personally, both backed by the same banking partners, both held to the same boutique service standard.
Fair Merchant Solutions was incorporated approximately 11 years ago to serve higher-risk merchants outside travel: coaching and consulting, supplements, digital agencies, ecommerce and DTC, subscription businesses, debt collection, clinics, and the categories that share the structural challenges of client-not-present transactions and future-delivery commitments.
Excellent Payment Services was created in October 2018 to serve the travel and tourism community specifically: tour operators, travel agencies, hospitality groups, future-delivery booking platforms, and the broader travel trade. Built on Eric's 17-year hospitality background and his decades of relationships across the travel industry.
Both brands share the same sponsor banking partners, the same interchange-plus pricing architecture, the same Savings Pledge, and the same operational team. They exist as separate brands because each industry world deserves a specialist conversation calibrated to it, not a generic merchant services pitch.
Founder & Principal
Eric Douay
Eric Douay is the founder and principal of the practice. Over more than three decades, his career has spanned international hospitality and merchant services improving how clients travel and how merchants transact.
Eric began his hospitality career with ACCOR Hotels in Paris before relocating to Canada to open and run ACCOR's first Canadian sales and marketing office. He then founded D-TOUR Marketing Inc., serving as the first and longest-standing Canadian sales and marketing representative for Concorde Hotels & Resorts, Relais & Châteaux, and Grupo Hotelero Gran Caribe. After 17 years in hospitality, Eric brought the same client-care discipline to merchant services. first as a representative for an established processor, and then by founding Fair Merchant Solutions to deliver the same service standard under his own name. In October 2018, he created Excellent Payment Services to serve the travel and tourism community specifically.
Eric received the Visionary Award at the Business Expert Forum at Harvard Faculty Club in 2015. He has been invited to speak at the Leadership Speakers Academy Faculty at West Point. He has served on the executive board of ACTA Quebec, the governing body for Canadian travel agencies, and spent 24 years on the executive board of Skål International Montreal, including two as President. He was a Chartered Member and President of the annual American Marketing Association Gala Award (Montreal Chapter, 1999) and is a graduate of the Roger Love Master Presenter Mentorship Program (2015–2019). Eric holds an MBA in international business and marketing from Marseille, France. He is fluent in French and English, with conversational Spanish and Italian and elementary Mandarin.
Partner & Operations
Chris Anderson, CPA
Chris Anderson, CPA, has nearly 30 years of professional experience, providing extensive strategic, operational, and financial C-level direction to small and medium-sized companies focused on payments, software, technology, and other emerging market sectors. Chris's diverse background and skillset provide a unique foundation for effective executive management and thought leadership.
Chris joined Eric's practice 10 years ago and is a key asset for client operations, overseeing underwriting and risk management, onboarding and integration, and customer support. Chris is a Summa Cum Laude graduate in Managerial Economics from the University of California, Davis, and is a Certified Public Accountant.
How we work.
Every engagement begins the same way: a 15-minute intro call with Eric. This call is not about pricing. It is about understanding your operation.
Eric will ask about your core business, how you deliver your service or product to your clients, what their journey looks like, how you currently take payments, and what your ideal scenario for credit card processing would be, regardless of your current merchant experience. Toward the end of the call, he will ask for an estimate of your annual credit card transaction volume.
By the end of the intro call, Eric will have decided whether the practice is the right fit for your business. If it is, the next step is the complimentary Merchant Account Optimization: a written 48-hour assessment of your true effective rate, the hidden fees eroding your margin, and what an interchange-plus structure backed by our nine banking partners would deliver. If there is a fit at that stage too, we present a guaranteed pricing offer.
Application timing: 1 to 2 business days from accepted offer to application submission. Banking partner adjudication and approval typically takes 5 to 7 business days from the moment all signed documents and supporting paperwork are received. Once approved, you receive your welcome memo, system credentials, and direct support contact. Onboarding to live processing is typically 1 to 2 business days.
Boutique service is the discipline. Every new client speaks with Eric personally during onboarding. Day-to-day support (technical issues, integration questions, urgent concerns) is handled by Chris and the experienced support team. We do not use chatbots. We do not operate a ticket queue. We are the chatbots.
Ready to talk?
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