What does invoicing cost once customers pay by card?

Once customers pay by card, the fees can cost more than the software, depending on how much they pay you by card. On twenty invoices a month averaging $250, card fees come to $149.50 to $171 a month depending on the tool and plan, while the lowest paid plan for one person in this guide is Wave (Pro) at $19 a month. The same invoices paid by bank transfer (ACH) cost $40 to $50 a month. A higher plan with a lower card rate pays for itself only well past this volume, so ask for bank transfers before you upgrade.

What do card fees cost at your volume?

Take twenty invoices a month at $250 each. Every tool below takes a percentage of each payment, most add a fixed amount per payment, and the totals sit close together, except where a plan charges a higher rate.

The table is fees only: add your plan’s price on top. Where a tool’s rate depends on the plan, it gets a row per plan.

Calculator

Work it out for your invoices

Enter a typical month. The tool applies each tool’s published rate to every payment, with its minimum and cap, and shows what moving invoices to bank transfer would change.

Invoices paid a month

Average invoice, in dollars$

Of those, paid by bank transfer

The rest are paid by card online.

Worked example

On 20 invoices a month averaging $250 ($5,000 in all), all paid by card online, fees run from $149.50 (QuickBooks Online) to $171 (Square Free) a month. If every one of them were paid by bank transfer, fees would run from $40 to $50.

Swipe or scroll the table sideways to see every column.

Invoicing and accounting. Fees on 20 invoices a month averaging $250 ($5,000 in all), all paid by card online, at each vendor’s published US rate for standard domestic cards (American Express, commercial, and international cards cost more where the vendor charges more). Fees only: where the rate is the same on every plan, add your plan’s price on top. Checked October 15, 2026.

Tool	Rate applies to	Your fees a month	If all paid by bank transfer
QuickBooks Online	All plans	$149.50	$50
Xero	All plans	$151	$50
FreshBooks	All plans	$151	$50
Wave	Starter	$157	$50
Wave	Pro	$151	$50
Zoho Books	All plans	$151	$40
Square Invoices	Square Free	$171	$50
Square Invoices	Square Plus	$151	$50
Square Invoices	Square Premium	$151	$50

Square’s help center says bank transfers (ACH) deposited into Square Checking carry no fee, on every plan. The Square bank-transfer figures here are for money paid out to another bank account; into Square Checking, Square charges no fee for them.

Plans that sell a lower rate, at your numbers

• Wave Pro ($19 a month) saves $6 in fees at your numbers. On fees alone it doesn’t cover its price: $157 in fees on Wave Starter, against $170 in fees and plan on Wave Pro. Wave says the lower card rate covers only the first 10 transactions in a month. Paid by card online, it never covers its price on fees: at $250 an invoice it saves at most $6 a month.
• Square Plus ($49 a month per location) saves $20 in fees at your numbers. On fees alone it doesn’t cover its price: $171 in fees on Square Free, against $200 in fees and plan on Square Plus. Paid by card online, it covers its price on fees from 49 invoices a month of $250.
• Square Premium ($149 a month per location) saves $20 in fees at your numbers. On fees alone it doesn’t cover its price: $171 in fees on Square Free, against $300 in fees and plan on Square Premium. Paid by card online, it covers its price on fees from 149 invoices a month of $250.

Cards typed in by hand, instant payouts, and international cards cost more on several tools and aren’t included.

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Why do small invoices cost more to collect?

Because the fixed part of the fee doesn’t shrink with the invoice. A hundred invoices a month at $50 each is the same money as the table above at a fifth of the size, and the fixed amount becomes a much larger share of each fee.

On a $50 invoice, Wave’s Starter plan takes $2.05 and QuickBooks $1.50. QuickBooks charges a percentage with no fixed amount per payment; Wave adds a fixed amount to every payment, and that part weighs more the smaller the invoice. If most of your invoices are small, compare the fixed part first.

How much do bank transfers save?

A lot. The same twenty invoices of $250 paid by bank transfer:

The bigger the invoice, the bigger the gap, because several tools cap the bank-transfer fee. On a single $2,000 invoice paid by bank transfer, Zoho Books takes $5, Xero $9, Square Plus $10, and QuickBooks, which states no cap, $20. By card, the same invoice costs $59.80 on QuickBooks.

Very small invoices are the exception: Wave and Square charge a minimum on each bank transfer, so on a $10 invoice a transfer costs $1 on Wave and $1 on Square Free, more than a card payment’s $0.89 on Wave’s Starter plan and $0.63 on Square Free.

The trade-off can be time: depending on the tool and your payout settings, a bank transfer may take longer to reach you than a card payment (Wave, for example, lists card payouts at two business days and bank payments at two to seven), and some customers want to pay by card no matter what. Offer both on every invoice, and ask your largest customers for a bank transfer by name.

Does a higher plan with a lower rate pay for itself?

Rarely, at this size. A lower rate saves a little on every payment, and the plan costs the same every month. Two tools in this guide sell a lower card rate with a higher plan, and on $250 invoices they come out very differently.

• Square Plus at $49 a month per location charges less per online card payment than Square Free. It covers its own price in fees from 49 invoices a month of $250 ($12,250 in card payments), per location. Below that, Square Free plus its fees is the smaller bill, and you’d buy Plus for its other features: payment schedules, custom invoice templates, and the cap on bank-transfer fees.
• Wave Pro at $19 a month takes no fixed amount on its first ten card payments each month, then charges the Starter rate. That saves at most $6 a month, so on fees alone it never covers its price. Buy Pro for automatic bank imports and receipt capture, not for the card rate.

QuickBooks says a business past a stated monthly volume may qualify for a discount on transaction costs; if you’re there, ask.

Example: a wholesale bakery

Say you run a two-person bakery that sells to four cafés, invoiced weekly: sixteen invoices a month at about $300 each, on Square because you also sell at a weekend market with Square’s card reader.

If every café pays by card online, Square Free’s fees come to $163.20 a month. Square Plus wouldn’t pay for itself on fees until 41 invoices a month of $300 ($12,300 in card payments), far past sixteen, so stay on Free. If all four cafés move to bank transfer instead, the month’s fees drop to $48 a month.

The difference is one conversation with four customers. The plan stays the same.

Costs that are easy to miss

• Some cards cost more. The tables use standard domestic cards. American Express, business and commercial cards, and cards issued abroad cost more on several tools: FreshBooks charges more for commercial and American Express cards, Wave for American Express, and Xero and Zoho for international cards.
• Typing in a card number costs more. A card keyed in by hand or charged from a saved card costs more than a card the customer enters on the invoice, on QuickBooks, Square, and FreshBooks.
• Getting the money today costs extra. Instant payouts or deposits are a separate percentage on QuickBooks, FreshBooks, and Zoho.
• Refunds don’t refund the fee. FreshBooks says so plainly; check your own tool before you refund a large card payment.

Our view

Card fees are the cost of getting paid quickly, and they’re worth it for most invoices. What isn’t worth it is paying them on the invoices where a customer would happily pay by bank transfer. Our position: offer both methods on every invoice, ask your biggest customers for a bank transfer, and choose your invoicing plan for its features, not its card rate. What this may give up is some speed, since on some tools bank transfers take longer to arrive, and a few customers will always pay by card.

Your next step

Open last month’s payouts in your invoicing tool and add up the fees. Then pick your three largest customers and ask each one to pay by bank transfer from the next invoice; turn on bank transfer as a payment option if it isn’t on already. Run a cleaning business? Our sister publication, SmallCrew HQ, covers card processing fees for cleaning businesses.