Feature tables weight everything equally and are built by whoever is selling. A scorecard makes you set your own weights, which is the actual decision.
Most vendors never make this decision, they inherit whatever the platform defaults to. It is worth $864 to $3,456 a year and it takes one setting.
Same platform, same volume, a $1,728 swing on one setting. The decision that moves this number is not which platform you choose, it is who pays the fee.
Square Online's free plan costs about $540 a year at $12,000 in sales. Cheddar Up's costs about $930. Both are honestly described as free, and the difference is one 95-cent fixed fee.
The subscription is usually the smallest line. Processing typically runs four to eight times larger, and the hours you spend exceed both.
A setup fee is a year-one-only cost, which means a platform can be the more expensive choice in year one and the cheaper one from year two. Only one of those numbers appears on a pricing page.
At 480 orders a year of $25, a $120 flat plan costs $1.28 an order and a free plan with a higher rate costs $1.13. They cross over at exactly 1,200 orders a year.
At $12,000 in annual sales that is roughly $120 in subscription and $612 all-in. If your number is above 8%, do not shop for a cheaper platform: name the line causing it.
The crossover is much lower than most vendors assume: roughly $170 to $400 a month in sales, not tens of thousands a year. What percentage pricing actually buys is insurance against a quiet month.
7-day free trial · $10/mo after · Cancel anytime
