Every line on your credit card processing statement falls into one of three buckets. Two you can't control. One is burning money you don't have to spend.
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Calculate your effective rate
Enter your monthly numbers. We'll compare your effective rate against the industry benchmark (~2.2%) and estimate how much you're overpaying.
Every fee on your statement comes from one of three places
Two are set by card networks and banks — you can't negotiate them. The third is where your processor makes money. That's the one worth fighting over.
Non-negotiable
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Interchange Fees
Goes to the card-issuing bank (Chase, Bank of America, etc.). Every time a customer pays with a credit card, that bank earns a fee. Set by Visa/Mastercard networks — your processor has zero control over it.
% of total fees~70–80%
Non-negotiable
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Assessments
Goes to the card networks (Visa, Mastercard, Discover) to fund infrastructure, fraud protection, and network operations. Also set by networks — not negotiable.
Typical rate0.13–0.15%
You control this
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Processor Markup
The spread your processor adds on top of interchange and assessments. This is their profit. This is the number you can negotiate — and most merchants never try.
Typical markup0.40–0.80%
The four hidden fees inside your statement
Processors don't advertise these. They're buried in your monthly statement and easy to overlook — but they add up fast.
PCI Compliance Fees
Charged monthly for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard compliance — or, more often, for non-compliance. Many processors bill $10–$50/month regardless of your actual compliance status, and add a separate annual non-compliance penalty if you skip the self-assessment questionnaire.
$120–$600/yr typicalOften reducible
What to do: Complete your annual PCI SAQ (free, takes 20 min) and ask your processor to remove the non-compliance surcharge.
Batch Fees
Charged every time you "settle" your terminal at end of day — essentially a per-batch processing fee. Typically $0.10–$0.30 per batch. If you batch once a day, that's $36–$109/year for nothing more than the routine settlement process.
$36–$110/yr typicalUsually negotiable
What to do: Ask your processor to waive or reduce batch fees — they're frequently removed for high-volume accounts.
Statement Fees
A monthly fee to access or receive your own statement — paper or digital. Some processors charge $5–$25/month for this. It's a pure margin fee with no corresponding service cost to your processor and is almost always negotiable.
$60–$300/yr typicalHighly negotiable
What to do: Call and ask it be removed. Most processors waive it immediately on request rather than lose the account.
IRS 1099-K Reporting Fees
Some processors charge a fee for generating the annual 1099-K tax form they're legally required to file anyway. This is a compliance requirement that costs processors next to nothing — but many bill $5–$20/year as a separate line item.
$5–$20/yr typicalAlmost always waivable
What to do: Dispute it directly — processors are already required to file this form. There's no legitimate justification for a surcharge.
Frequently asked questions
Your effective rate is the total percentage of your card volume you pay in processing fees: (Total Fees ÷ Total Volume) × 100. For example, $2,200 in fees on $85,000 in volume = a 2.59% effective rate. The industry average runs 2.2–2.5%. Above 3.0% typically means your markup is too high or you have avoidable fees baked in.
No. Only the processor markup is negotiable. Interchange fees (paid to card-issuing banks) and assessment fees (paid to card networks like Visa and Mastercard) are set by the networks and cannot be changed — not by you, not by your processor. The markup is your processor's profit margin, and it's the one piece you can push back on. It typically represents 20–30% of your total processing costs.
At minimum, once a year. But also review after any processor rate change notice — processors can adjust fees with just 30 days notice. Small fee creep is common: processors add $5–$15/month in new charges, knowing most merchants don't notice. A 15-minute annual review typically catches hundreds or thousands in unnecessary fees.
Interchange is the fee paid to the bank that issued your customer's credit card — Chase, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, etc. Visa and Mastercard publish the rates in pricing tables with 600+ categories based on card type, transaction method, and merchant industry. Your processor passes this cost through to you unchanged. It accounts for roughly 70–80% of your total processing bill and is completely outside your processor's — or your — control.
Three levers work: (1) Negotiate your markup. Call your processor, ask for a rate review, and reference competitor quotes. Most processors have room to move on accounts doing $50K+/month. (2) Eliminate junk fees. PCI, statement, and batch fees are often removed on request. (3) Optimize transaction setup. Card-present transactions cost less than card-not-present. Avoiding "non-qualified" downgrades saves money on rewards card transactions.
Not necessarily. Many merchants save 20–40% by negotiating with their current processor first — no switching required. Bring a competitive quote and ask for a rate match. If they won't move after two conversations, switching typically takes 2 weeks and causes zero sales interruption. The savings usually recover any switching cost within the first month or two.
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