What good deals save, shown on real bills
These are real invoices and merchant statements that have crossed our desk, transcribed with the businesses' identifying details removed and every figure left exactly as billed. Each one puts a number on the thing rate tables can't show: what a negotiated deal saves against list prices and flat-rate readers - £2,680 a year below list at one food store, £1,052 a year from a single negotiated Amex line - and what a careful read finds on statements that looked fine, down to a £480-a-year fee for an unfilled form.
How to read them: we name the provider and the numbers, never the business. Where a deal is good we say so - two of the five verdicts below are "stay put".
The 3p fee that outweighs the headline rate
A 0.60% debit rate that costs 0.89% once the 3p-per-transaction fee does its work on a £14.62 average basket.
£2,680 a year below list price
Read the teardownTwo Dojo contracts, two price books
Same provider as our food-store case, different price book: 0.77% debit, a 5p secure fee, and business cards at 2.25%.
£2,250 a year cheaper than a flat-rate reader - with more on the table
Read the teardownThe restaurant that negotiated its Amex problem away
A £106 average bill, one in five payments on Amex - and an Amex rate negotiated to 0.99% where others pay 1.90%.
£1,052 a year from one negotiated line
Read the teardownThe £40-a-month fee for not filling in a form
A £7 average basket where 4p of fixed fees adds 0.57 points to a 0.31% headline rate - plus £40 a month for an unfilled PCI form.
£480 a year found in one line
Read the teardownA good deal with two expensive habits
A genuinely good 0.75% trailing rate - and an Amex line eating 24% of the card fees from 11% of the volume.
£856 a year identified on the Amex line alone
Read the teardownAbout the series
Documents come from our free statement review service. We remove names, addresses, merchant IDs and every other identifying detail before publishing; the fee lines, rates and totals are unedited. Effective rates are calculated as total fees before VAT divided by the card volume billed at card-type rates in the period. Providers are named because the documents are genuine and the analysis is factual - including where the provider's deal is the right one to keep.
Corrections policy applies here as everywhere: errors are logged publicly.
Want yours read the same way?
Send one recent statement and we do exactly this for your business, privately: every line explained, the effective rate computed, and an honest verdict - including "stay put" when that's the answer. Free, no obligation. Mon to Fri, 9am to 5:30pm.