Most UK businesses are overpaying on card fees — without knowing it.
The headline rate your current provider quotes is rarely what you end up paying. Terminal rental, compliance charges, tiered pricing, and settlement delays add up in ways that are easy to miss — and hard to find on a statement.
What you're probably paying for
Beyond the rate you were quoted.
Terminal rental
Many traditional acquirers charge £15–40/month per terminal, every month, regardless of whether you use it. This is separate from transaction fees.
Tiered and interchange-plus pricing
The headline rate applies to the cheapest card type. Premium cards, corporate cards, and international cards are charged at a higher tier — often without a clear breakdown on your statement.
Monthly minimums and PCI fees
PCI compliance charges, monthly minimum usage fees, and authorisation fees compound invisibly. They rarely appear as a single line on statements.
Settlement timing
T+3 settlement (money arriving three business days after trading) has a real cash flow cost compared to same-day or next-day alternatives. Most businesses never factor this in.
What the gap typically looks like
General benchmarks by monthly card volume. Not your number — that comes from the review.
Small independent trader, market stall, mobile service
The gap between legacy and modern pricing is often modest in absolute terms, but disproportionate relative to turnover. Monthly terminal rental alone can represent 0.4–0.8% of monthly card volume.
Café, salon, small restaurant, convenience store
This is the bracket where hidden charges compound most visibly. Total processing costs on legacy pricing regularly run 0.5–1% higher than flat-rate alternatives when terminal fees, tiered rates, and compliance charges are included.
Busy hospitality, multi-service, growing retail
At this volume, the absolute monthly overpayment is meaningful. Businesses in this bracket are most likely to have been on unchanged terms for years — and most likely to benefit from a structured review.
These are illustrative ranges based on typical market conditions, not a personalised calculation. Your actual figure depends on your card mix, provider terms, and trading volume.
Why the headline rate doesn't tell the whole story
Traditional payment providers structure their pricing to make direct comparison difficult. The rate you were quoted when you signed up may be accurate for a debit card from a domestic customer paying with a basic card — and significantly higher for the card types you actually see at the till.
A flat-rate provider charges the same percentage regardless of card type, with no monthly hardware fees and no minimum usage charges. The comparison between the two is rarely straightforward to make from a statement alone.
The review we offer is specifically designed to do this comparison for you — using your actual trading volume and card mix, not an industry average.