Here is a two-minute exercise that beats most sales pitches you will hear about payments.
Take last month's statement. Find total fees. Find total volume processed. Divide the first by the second. That number is your effective rate, and it is the only rate that describes what you actually paid.
Why it never matches the quote
The rate you were sold was a qualifying rate: the best case, on the cleanest card, under the right conditions. Your real mix includes rewards cards, corporate cards, keyed-in transactions and chargebacks, each priced differently. Add monthly fees, gateway fees, PCI fees and batch fees, and the gap between quoted and effective is usually larger than the savings anyone is pitching you.
This is not necessarily anyone cheating you. It is that the quoted number and the paid number were never the same number, and almost nobody goes back to check.
What to do with the number
- Compare like for like. Any proposal you evaluate should be quoted against your effective rate, not against a qualifying rate.
- Read the fee lines, not the headline. A lower percentage with higher fixed fees can cost more at your average ticket.
- Know your mix. Card type, average ticket and volume decide more of your cost than the headline rate does.
The honest version of our pitch
We publish rates as low as 1.9% on qualified transactions, and that is a qualifying rate too — the same species of number as the one you were originally sold. It is not a promise about your blended cost.
Which is exactly why the statement comes first. We would rather show you the arithmetic on your own volume than quote you a number that sounds good and means little.
If a processor will not put your effective rate in writing before and after, the proposal is a guess.
Run the division yourself first. Then whoever you talk to — us or anyone else — has to beat a number you already understand.