Statement teardown · Dojo
Two 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%.
- The business
- a village dining pub in the East of England
- The document
- Monthly Dojo invoice (31 days)
- Period
- the December trading month
- Card sales billed
- £46,778.73
- Payments / average
- 989 / £47.30
- Fees (ex VAT) / effective rate
- £603.05 / 1.29%
The saving in this document
£2,250 a year cheaper than a flat-rate reader - with more on the table
Even this weaker price book beats the cheapest flat-rate alternative: SumUp at 1.69% would cost £790.56 for December's volume against £603.05 billed here, a £187.51 monthly gap worth £2,250 a year. The money still on the table is the gap to the food store's price book: matching its 0.60% debit rate and 3p secure fee would have cut a further £69.39 off this same month, £832 a year.
Where the money went, as billed
Debit cards
727 transactions, £28,923.21 at 0.77% = £222.71
Credit cards
212 transactions, £11,548.75 at 1.43% = £165.15
Business cards
30 transactions, £5,513.02 at 2.25% = £124.05 - 12% of volume producing 24% of the rate bill
American Express
20 transactions, £793.75 at 1.90% = £15.08
Secure transaction fee
1,011 charges at £0.05 = £50.55 - 5p per transaction where the food store pays 3p
Non-qualifying surcharge
7 transactions, £659.95 at 0.50% = £3.30
Hardware
Dojo Go £15.00 + Hardware care £5.00 = £20.00
What the numbers say
Read next to the food store's invoice in this series, this one settles an argument: provider rates are not prices, they are outcomes of a negotiation. Same provider, same invoice template, and this pub pays 0.77% on debit where the food store pays 0.60%, and 5p per secure transaction where the food store pays 3p. Nothing on either invoice explains the difference, because the explanation is not on the invoice - it is whatever each business accepted when it signed.
The expensive line here is the card mix. A dining pub takes lunch tabs on company cards, and 30 business-card payments - 12% of the month's volume - produced £124.05 at 2.25%, which is 24% of the entire rate bill. Add a credit-card share of one payment in five at 1.43%, and December's effective rate lands at 1.29% before VAT, 45% higher than the food store's despite the bigger average ticket.
Even so, the flat-rate comparison stays instructive: the same month at SumUp's 1.69% would cost £790.56 in transaction fees alone. The pub's deal is not broken. It is simply carrying three negotiable lines - the business-card rate, the debit rate and the secure fee - at levels another Dojo customer demonstrably does not pay.
Our verdict
The case for this pub is a renegotiation with its own statement as evidence. The business-card rate is the first line to challenge: 2.25% against the 1.99% the food store pays for the same card class, on the card class this pub takes most expensively. The comparison merchant is not a rate table on the internet - it is another customer of the same provider.
This is a genuine document reviewed through our free statement review service. The business's name, location details, merchant ID and every other identifier have been removed; the fee lines, rates and totals are reproduced unedited. Spot an error? It goes on the public corrections log.
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Read itRelated reading: the fees calculator, the exit fees database and the switching guide.