During the pandemic, it is now common to see convenience fees in many industries and businesses - for grocery delivery and pickup, restaurant delivery and pickup, to help cover increased overhead costs for sanitizing and other regulation.

The other "convenience fee" that is becoming more mainstream is a fee for the convenience of using a credit card. In technical terms, it is called surcharging, but many business owners think of it as a fee passed on to the customer for the convenience of using a credit card vs paying in cash.  Typical fees charged are 3.99%.  On a $10 sale that translates to roughly .40 cents per transaction.  

While this seems like a relatively small amount, for a business when you add that up over all your credit card transactions, now we are talking some real money.  For a customer with $50,000 in monthly credit card sales, this translates into ~ $2,000 savings in credit card fees per month or $24,000 per year!  Now that gets a person's attention.  

This is an ongoing series of articles about cash discounting and surcharging programs.

I recently returned from a conference and attended a session by Clearent to learn more about this hot topic in the payment world.  The number one take away from this conference - you need to follow the rules very carefully - and work with a partner that knows what they are doing!

Did you know that cash discounting and surcharging programs for credit card fees is legal in most states. We have seen an uptick in the use of these methods to offset credit card fees in some locations locally, but isn't common in most businesses - yet.  So, we decided it was time to learn more: