Restaurant POS · United States and United Kingdom
Toast card processing fees: what a shop actually pays
This provider publishes prices, but not ones a total can be built from. Either the rate is quoted as a starting figure, or it is interchange plus a markup, where the largest part of the cost is set by the card networks and is not published anywhere on the page.
Everything below is what the provider does state publicly, with the parts it does not state marked as such.
What does the provider publish?
Toast 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter Kit | none | free | not published | not published | — | $0/month with a hardware kit at no upfront cost. The processing rate is not published; it is quoted per restaurant. |
| Point of Sale | $69.00 | not stated | not published | not published | — | Published as a starting figure, not a rate, so it is not computed here. Starting at $69/month. Monthly software subscription; choose your own hardware. Retail version from $90/month. |
| Starter | £80.00 VAT basis not stated | not stated | not published | not published | — | Published as a starting figure, not a rate, so it is not computed here. Starting at GBP 80/month, including the first hardware terminal subscription. |
| Essentials | £150.00 VAT basis not stated | not stated | not published | not published | — | GBP 150/month, adding a kitchen display system and a handheld. Processing quoted as a per-transaction flat rate. |
UK providers do not publish on the same basis.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.
Card-present rate: not stated in the provider's published pages (checked 2026-08-25).
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).
Contract length: 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 is fixed and what moves with sales?
Toast publishes no card rate at all and quotes it per business. On Point of Sale the fixed part is $69.00 a month before a single card is tapped, which is 1.38% of card sales at $5,000 a month and 0.14% 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
- You cannot budget from this page. Ask for the rate in writing, for debit and credit separately, plus the monthly fee, the terminal cost, the minimum monthly charge and the length of the contract, before anyone books a call.
- Ask what the rate is on business and foreign cards. It is the most common reason a statement comes back higher than the quote.
- Providers that do publish a rate are listed in the full list.
Who this page is not for
This is not a review. We have not used Toast, 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
- Toast pricing page — every figure on this page. checked 2026-08-25
- Toast 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.