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Glossary

Payment-Processing Fee

What is a payment-processing fee in field service software? The per-transaction cut your FSM vendor takes on every card swipe, and why it costs more than the subscription.

Related: bring your own payments add on creep total cost of ownership

Definition

A payment-processing fee is the per-transaction percentage a payment processor takes when a customer pays by card. In field service SaaS, this is typically charged by the vendor’s in-app payments rail: HCP Payments, Jobber Payments, Workiz Pay.

The typical rate: 2.49–3.49% per swipe in the SMB FSM category.

Concrete example

A 5-tech plumbing shop processing £200,000 of annual card-paid revenue:

  • HCP Payments at 2.49%: £4,980/year
  • HCP Payments at 3.49%: £6,980/year
  • Jobber Payments at 2.9% + 30p: approximately £5,800/year
  • Stripe (bring-your-own) at 1.5% + 20p (UK): approximately £3,000/year

The payments rake is 3–5x the annual software subscription cost. Most comparison articles rank FSM tools on scheduling UX and glossy feature lists; they do not show this line item.

Why this matters when choosing FSM software

The single most important spec most buyers never ask about is: “Can I bring my own Stripe or Square account?”

  • Workiz: yes, cleanly. Stripe integration is documented and supported.
  • Housecall Pro: technically yes, but the UX pushes you toward HCP Payments.
  • Jobber: no bring-your-own option. All card payments route through Jobber Payments.
  • ServiceTitan: no bring-your-own option.

On £200K of annual card revenue, bringing your own Stripe (1.5% + 20p) versus using a 3% vendor rail saves approximately £2,000–£4,000/year, more than the entire software subscription.

Further reading