If you write a card fee on the invoice or key it in yourself, read this before the next one. You don’t have to take our word for any of it. Every headline below opens the real article.
Nine stories, five states, 2022 to 2025. Tap any one to read it.
Screenshots taken October 2026 from the pages linked. None of them thought it would be them.
Visa and Mastercard publish what a card fee has to be. A fee you add yourself is on the wrong side of most of it, every time.
| Visa and Mastercard say a card fee must be | A hand-added fee |
|---|---|
| Registered with your processor 30 days before you start | Never done |
| Shown to the customer before they pay, and itemized on the receipt | Receipt only |
| On credit cards only. Never on a debit or prepaid card | Every card |
| Capped. Visa set the ceiling for a surcharge at 3% in April 2023 | Usually over |
You can’t tell a debit card from a credit card by hand, and the app you key it into never registered the fee. So a hand-added fee breaks at least two of the four brand rules every time, usually three. It doesn’t matter how long you’ve done it or how fair the number feels. Rules by state differ too: our surcharge checker has the state-by-state view.
Visa’s fine schedule, as summarized by the law firm ArentFox Schiff in July 2023. Visa’s own merchant Q&A confirms the first $1,000.
| First notice | $1,000 |
| Plus a written plan to fix it, on a deadline | required |
| Deadline missed | $25,000 |
| 30 days after that | $50,000 |
| 60 days | $75,000 |
| 90 days | $100,000 |
| Past 180 days, every month until fixed | +$25,000 |
Visa bills the processor. The processor’s agreement passes it to you, and the account can be closed. The Wisconsin restaurant above went straight to the $25,000 tier. Enforcement is uneven, and nobody can tell you when or whether a notice comes. The exposure is real, and it is yours as long as the fee is yours.
Same fee. Same phones. The only thing that changes is who carries the exposure.
We set it up to your state's rules and the card-brand rules. If it is not better for you, you leave. No contract, no cancellation fee, nothing owed.
Move the slider to your monthly card sales. This is the whole comparison, nothing hidden.
These are posted card prices, not a surcharge. A surcharge is a fee added on top of your price, and Visa caps that at 3%. Dual pricing posts both prices, cash and card, so the cap does not apply to it. We set the program up to your state’s rules and the card-brand rules.
AllPro Rebate is paid monthly on eligible card volume processed through us at $10,000 a month and up, while you keep your posted card price. Loyalty bonus paid in two halves after months 3 and 6 as cumulative volume reaches $30,000 and $60,000. Dual Pricing and AllPro Rebate are set up to your state’s rules and the card-brand rules, and aren’t available everywhere. App figures are estimates from the number you enter, using published flat-rate pricing, not a quote for your account.
Square has its own surcharge switch. Read what it allows: 3% maximum, credit cards only, in person only. Debit stays on you. A hand-written 5% on every card is outside even Square’s own tool.
So "I’ll just turn it on in the app" cuts your fee to 3%, keeps it off debit, and still leaves every invoice you key in by hand where it was.
Square Support, "Set up and manage credit card surcharges" (source 4). Square’s rules can change; the linked page has the current ones. Thinking about the switch? Our AllProPay vs Square page is the side-by-side.
Same idea, built the other way around. Your price is the card price, and cash pays less. That is dual pricing: a cash price and a card price shown side by side before anyone pays, so there is no fee on top and nothing to write in.
We set it up to your state’s rules and the card-brand rules. Where it isn’t a fit, we tell you, and interchange-plus is there instead.
Read more: surcharge vs cash discount vs dual pricing and how we handle chargebacks.
We fill in the application together on the phone, you e-sign, and the app is on your phone the same day. No contract, no cancellation fee, no setup fee.