The Canadian merchant's guide to credit card processing fees (2026)

Card fees are one of the few costs that grow every time your business does well. More sales, more fees. Most owners know the number on the monthly statement but not what it is made of, which makes it hard to tell a fair price from an expensive one.

This guide breaks the cost of a card sale into its parts, lists the extra fees that show up on Canadian statements, and gives you one number to compare any two offers.

The three parts of every card fee

Whatever your statement calls it, the cost of a credit card sale is three amounts added together:

• Interchange: paid to the bank that issued your customer's card. Visa and Mastercard publish the rates, and they are the same whichever processor you use.
• Network (assessment) fees: a small charge kept by Visa or Mastercard for running the network. Also published, also the same for everyone.
• Processor markup: what your processor keeps. It is the only part that is negotiable, and the only part that differs between offers.

Interchange is usually the largest of the three. It varies with the card: a premium rewards card or a business card costs more than a basic card, and a card keyed in or used online costs more than one tapped at your terminal. Our article on interchange fees goes into the details.

Debit is a different world

Interac debit does not work like credit. It is usually priced as a small flat amount per transaction rather than a percentage, which makes it far cheaper on larger tickets. A business whose customers mostly pay by debit pays much less overall than one whose customers favour rewards credit cards, even at the same processor. See debit vs credit costs.

The fees beyond the rate

The percentage is only part of the bill. Look for these lines on your statement:

• Monthly account or statement fees.
• Terminal rental or software fees, per device or per location.
• PCI compliance or non-compliance fees.
• Chargeback fees, charged each time a customer disputes a sale.
• Minimum monthly fees, charged when your fees fall under a threshold.
• Early termination fees in the agreement, which apply if you leave before the term ends.

None of these is unusual on its own. What matters is that you know which ones you pay, and that they are in writing before you sign.

One number to compare offers: your effective rate

Add up every fee deducted in a month and divide by your total card sales for the same month. The result is your effective rate. It includes everything, whatever the pricing model, so it is the only fair way to compare your current processor with a new offer.

As an illustration only: $1,250 in total fees on $50,000 of card sales is an effective rate of 2.5%. Do the same calculation on two or three recent statements, because the mix of cards changes from month to month.

Our guide to reading a processor statement shows where each number sits on a typical Canadian statement.

What to ask before you sign

Four questions settle most offers:

• Is the pricing interchange-plus, flat-rate or tiered?
• What is the full list of monthly and per-device fees?
• Is there a contract term, and what does leaving early cost?
• Who do I call when something breaks, and in which language?

SavPay reviews statements for free and replies in writing with the effective rate you pay today and what you would pay with us, line by line.