Card processing
See what card processing really costs you
Send one to three recent statements. John reviews them and sends back a signed report with your real numbers. It's free, and there's no sales call unless you ask for one.
What the report shows
- Your effective rate: total fees divided by total card sales
- Processor markup above interchange and card brand fees
- Fees you can remove or negotiate, with a yearly cost for each
- A check of your surcharge or cash-discount setup against card-network and state rules
- What the current status of the Visa and Mastercard merchant settlement means for you
Compliance notes are general information, not legal advice. Savings are an estimate until you have a written quote.
What happens next is up to you
- Stay and negotiateWe give you the exact points to raise with your current processor. You owe nothing.
- Compare a written quoteIf switching makes sense, we arrange a quote showing the rate, every fee and the contract terms.
- Switch only if the numbers workSavings are shown after any one-time costs of switching.
How we get paid on processing
The review is free. If you switch through Aequitas, the processor pays us a share of its revenue for as long as your account stays active.
We don't charge a percentage of processing savings. Moving fees onto your customers through surcharging or "zero-fee" programs doesn't count as savings in our math.
Who we're a good fit for
Businesses processing roughly $15,000 to $500,000 a month in cards, especially on flat-rate or tiered pricing, or running a surcharge program nobody has checked.
How card fees work
Interchange
Paid to the bank that issued your customer's card. Visa and Mastercard set these rates, and every processor pays the same ones. Rewards and business cards cost more, and debit costs much less.
Card brand fees
Small fees that card networks charge for using their networks. These are also the same at every processor.
Processor markup
What your processor keeps: a percentage, a per-transaction fee, or both. This is the part you can negotiate or shop.
Tiered pricing
"Qualified," "mid-qualified" and "non-qualified" rates bundle interchange and markup together. The processor decides which tier each sale lands in, which makes pricing hard to compare.
Effective rate
Total fees divided by total card sales. It's the best single number for comparing what you pay under any pricing model.
PCI non-compliance fees
A monthly penalty for not completing a yearly security questionnaire. It usually goes away once you complete it.
Prefer a self-serve tool?
Our Statement Analyzer is in accuracy testing against real statements. Until it passes, John reads every statement himself.