Card reader / mobile POS · United Kingdom and United States
SumUp card processing fees: what a shop actually pays
On its cheapest published plan, SumUp charges 2.60% + $0.10 on a card taken in person. For a shop taking $5,000 a month on cards, that plan costs $150 a month — 3.00% of everything it takes once the monthly fee and the hardware are counted across three years. The shop keeps 97.00%.
That is 0.40 percentage points above the advertised 2.60%. The difference is the $0.10 charged on every sale.
What does the provider publish?
SumUp 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pay-as-you-go | none | not stated | 2.60% + $0.10 | 3.50% | 3.00% | 2.6% + 10c in person; 3.5% + 15c online and manual entry. No monthly minimums or hidden fees. |
| POS with Connect Plus | $199.00 | not stated | 2.60% + $0.10 | 3.50% | 6.98% | $199/month: cloud POS, customer database, installation and training. |
| Pay as you go | none ex VAT | £25 once | 1.69% (no flat fee stated) | not published | 1.70% | 1.69% per transaction for card reader payments. Solo Lite GBP 25. No setup fees, no rentals, no monthly minimums. |
| Tap to Pay | none ex VAT | free | 1.69% (no flat fee stated) | not published | 1.69% | No hardware: payments are taken on the merchant's own phone. |
| Payments Plus | £19.00 ex VAT | £79 once | 0.99% (no flat fee stated) | 2.50% | 1.41% | 0.99% for domestic consumer cards. Online 2.50%. Non-EU or corporate cards, including Amex, 1.69%. |
UK providers do not publish on the same basis.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.
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Per-transaction fee: 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).
Time to payout: 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pay-as-you-go | 3.00% | 3.00% | 3.00% | 3.00% | 3.00% | 3.00% |
| POS with Connect Plus | 22.90% | 12.95% | 6.98% | 4.99% | 3.80% | 3.40% |
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The same provider in United Kingdom
SumUp publishes different figures for this market, in GBP. We do not convert between currencies, so the two are printed side by side and never averaged. Its cheapest published plan there is Payments Plus at 0.99% (no flat fee stated), which comes to 1.41% of card sales at £5,000 a month.
| Plan | £1,000 | £2,000 | £5,000 | £10,000 | £25,000 | £50,000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pay as you go | 1.76% | 1.72% | 1.70% | 1.70% | 1.69% | 1.69% |
| Tap to Pay | 1.69% | 1.69% | 1.69% | 1.69% | 1.69% | 1.69% |
| Payments Plus | 3.11% | 2.05% | 1.41% | 1.20% | 1.07% | 1.03% |
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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?
SumUp publishes both the percentage and the per-transaction fee. On POS with Connect Plus the fixed part is $199.00 a month before a single card is tapped, which is 3.98% of card sales at $5,000 a month and 0.40% 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 effective rate is what matters, PayPal (Zettle) works out at 2.67% on the same basis — $601 less across three years at $5,000 a month — compare the two.
- Do not decide yet, but a quiet month will not change this one: the plan holds at 3.00% of sales whether the shop takes $5,000 or $50,000 a month, because there is no monthly fee to spread. 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 SumUp, 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
- SumUp pricing page — every figure on this page. checked 2026-08-25
- SumUp 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
- SumUp alternatives, by effective rate
- 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
- SumUp vs PayPal (Zettle)
- SumUp vs Square
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.