How to charge a card fee

If accepting a card costs you a percentage, you can add that to the sale. The setting is not in your tax settings, where most people look for it: it belongs to each payment method, because that is what decides whether a fee applies at all.

1. 1

   Open Settings → Payment Methods

   The fee lives on the method, not on the store. Your Taxes screen only links here — it does not hold the setting.

2. 2

   Turn the fee on for the methods that cost you

   Enable the card fee on the methods you actually pay a processor for. Cash does not get one. A local transfer app you receive for free does not get one either — charging a fee on a method that costs you nothing is the fastest way to lose the argument at the counter.

3. 3

   Set the rate

   Enter the percentage. Use what your processor actually charges you, including their fixed portion if you are absorbing it. A rate invented to be safe is a rate a customer will eventually check.

4. 4

   See what the customer sees

   At checkout both the cashier and the customer get the line "Paying by card adds …" with the amount and the rate, before the sale is completed. Nobody discovers the fee on the receipt.

5. 5

   Understand a split payment

   The fee is charged on the card portion only, not on the whole order total. A customer paying half in cash and half on card pays the fee on their half — which is the correct behaviour and worth knowing, because the opposite would overcharge every split sale in your shop.

6. 6

   Apply it to an order you are editing

   An order being edited has an apply card processing fee control of its own, so a fee can be added or left off a specific sale without changing your defaults.