Countertop POS for retail · United States
Lightspeed Retail card processing fees: what a shop actually pays
On its cheapest published plan, Lightspeed Retail charges 1.50% (no flat fee stated) on a card taken in person. For a shop taking $5,000 a month on cards, that plan costs $164 a month — 3.28% of everything it takes once the monthly fee and the hardware are counted across three years. The shop keeps 96.72%.
That is 1.78 percentage points above the advertised 1.50%. The difference is the $89.00 monthly fee.
What does the provider publish?
Lightspeed Retail publishes the plans below on its own pricing page; the last column quotes the conditions in the provider's words.
| Plan | Monthly fee | Hardware | In person | Online or keyed | Effective at 5,000 a month | As published |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | $89.00 | not stated | 1.50% (no flat fee stated) | not published | 3.28% | $89 USD/mo. Lightspeed Payments card-present rate 1.5%. No per-transaction figure is published. |
| Core | $149.00 | not stated | 1.50% (no flat fee stated) | not published | 4.48% | $149 USD/mo. The same 1.5% card-present rate across tiers. |
| Plus | $289.00 | not stated | 1.50% (no flat fee stated) | not published | 7.28% | $289 USD/mo. Prices can vary and additional service fees may apply depending on the nature of the business. |
| Retail Basic | £75.00 VAT basis not stated | not stated | not published | not published | — | GBP 75/mo. The UK page does not publish a payments rate. |
| Retail Core | £149.00 VAT basis not stated | not stated | not published | not published | — | GBP 149/mo. Prices can vary and additional service fees may apply. |
| Retail Plus | £189.00 VAT basis not stated | not stated | not published | not published | — | GBP 189/mo. |
UK providers do not publish on the same basis. Monthly fees and hardware are printed exactly as published, and where the provider states the basis we print it. At 20% VAT an ex-VAT fee is 1.2 times higher on the invoice, so an ex-VAT figure and an inc-VAT figure are not comparable as printed. We do not convert between them.
Scroll sideways on a phone.
Per-transaction fee: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
Online or keyed rate: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
Online per-transaction fee: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
Hardware price: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
Chargeback fee: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
VAT basis: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
What does it cost at the size of shop you actually are?
The same plan is a different price depending on how much goes through the card machine, because the fixed part does not move.
| Plan | $1,000 | $2,000 | $5,000 | $10,000 | $25,000 | $50,000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Basic | 10.40% | 5.95% | 3.28% | 2.39% | 1.86% | 1.68% |
| Core | 16.40% | 8.95% | 4.48% | 2.99% | 2.10% | 1.80% |
| Plus | 30.40% | 15.95% | 7.28% | 4.39% | 2.66% | 2.08% |
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How that is worked out
The average sale is an assumption of this site, not a published figure: $25.00 in the United States and £20.00 in the United Kingdom. It decides how heavily a per-transaction fee lands, so the calculator lets you change it. Interchange, chargebacks, refunds, currency conversion, sales tax and VAT are not in any figure on this site, because the pricing page does not price them for a given shop. Every figure here is a floor. The full method is at Method.
What is fixed and what moves with sales?
Lightspeed Retail publishes a percentage but no per-transaction fee. On Basic the fixed part is $89.00 a month before a single card is tapped, which is 1.78% of card sales at $5,000 a month and 0.18% at $50,000. checked 2026-08-25
A percentage on its own says nothing about what a small shop pays. The monthly fee, the terminal and the per-transaction fee are fixed amounts, so they land hardest on the shops with the least card volume — which is the opposite of how the headline rate reads.
Who owns it?
Who owns this company is not stated on its own site, and we could not confirm it from a primary source. We have left it blank rather than repeat what other sites say.
Where this leaves you
- If the shop takes under $2,000 a month, this plan is 10.40% of card sales, not 3.28%. The fixed part is the whole of that difference.
- No per-transaction fee is stated on the page. We compute as though there is none. If the provider quotes one later, every figure here rises, and a small average sale is where it would show first.
- Do not decide yet if your card takings move with the season: this plan is 3.28% of sales at $5,000 a month and 1.68% at $50,000, and chargebacks, refunds and foreign cards are in neither figure — what the headline rate leaves out.
Who this page is not for
This is not a review. We have not used Lightspeed Retail, we hold no opinion on its hardware or its support, and nothing here is a recommendation. It answers one question: what the published price turns into as a share of card sales.
Sources
- Lightspeed Retail pricing page — every figure on this page. checked 2026-08-25
- Lightspeed Retail UK pricing page. checked 2026-08-25
- data.json — the row behind this page, with the source URL and check date on every figure.
Related
- Every provider we hold, and which publish a rate
- Work out your own effective rate
- The three numbers behind a card rate: the fixed fee, the flat fee and the floor
- How these figures are produced
Written by Kaz (pen name). Figures are copied from providers' published pricing pages on the dates shown. We have not used these products. Corrections: contact form.