How Much Do Card Payments Cost Restaurants in the UK?
What do card payments actually cost a UK restaurant?
On a blended rate, most UK restaurants pay 1-2.5% of their card turnover in processing fees. Take £100,000 a month through cards and that's £1,000-£2,500 gone every month, before the monthly account charges show up.
Where you land in that range comes down to which cards your customers hand over, who your provider is and what the contract says, whether you're on blended or interchange++ pricing, and add-ons like terminal rental and PCI fees.
UK card processing rates by card type
Debit cards
The Payment Services Regulations cap interchange on UK consumer debit cards at 0.2%. The acquirer puts its margin on top, so if most of your customers pay by debit, expect a blended rate of roughly 0.3-0.6%.
Consumer credit cards
Interchange on UK consumer credit cards is capped at 0.3%. Once the acquirer's margin goes on, most restaurant contracts end up around 0.7-1.2%.
Business and corporate credit cards
No cap here. Fees run from 1.5% to 3%, sometimes more. If a lot of your trade is lunches on company cards and expense accounts, your average rate will climb because of it.
Non-UK cards
Cards issued outside the UK and EU aren't capped either. Restaurants in tourist spots and city centres take more of them, and their average rate goes up accordingly.
The fixed costs restaurants forget about
The percentage on each transaction is the number everyone looks at. The monthly fees are usually what catches people out.
| Cost type | Typical range | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly account fee | £10-£50+ | Often waived at higher volumes |
| Terminal rental | £15-£40/month per device | Some providers tie you into 3-5 year contracts |
| PCI DSS compliance | £5-£30/month | Many acquirers charge this for card data security |
| Chargeback fee | £15-£35 per dispute | You pay it whether you win or lose |
| Early exit fee | £100-£1,000+ | Depends entirely on the contract |
Say your headline rate is 1.5%, but you're also paying £35 a month for terminal rental, £20 for PCI and £15 in account fees. That's £840 a year before you've processed a single card.
Blended rate vs interchange++: which is cheaper?
A blended rate averages every card type into one percentage. It's easy to read on a statement. The catch is that you pay the same rate on a cheap UK debit card as on an expensive corporate card.
Interchange++ passes through the actual wholesale cost of each card type, plus the provider's markup, itemised. The statements are harder to follow. But if most of your customers pay by UK debit card, which is the case for most UK restaurants, it usually works out cheaper.
Quick example. You take £80,000 a month in cards: 70% UK debit at 0.3% and 30% consumer credit at 1.0%.
- On a 1.5% blended rate: £1,200 a month
- On interchange++ (weighted average around 0.5%): £400 a month
That's £800 a month difference, close to £10,000 a year. The gap gets bigger as volume grows.
What integrated payments means for a restaurant
In most restaurants the card machine and the restaurant POS system don't talk to each other. Staff read the total off the POS screen and type it into the terminal by hand.
Typing totals by hand is how £84.50 turns into £48.50. It's also extra work at every table, and it means there's no one place to see revenue across all your channels.
With integrated payments, the POS sends the amount straight to the card reader. Nobody keys anything in and the transaction reconciles automatically. Payments at the counter, online ordering and kiosk payments all land in the same report.
Flipdish does integrated POS and payments for restaurants: one platform for in-person and digital orders, and one payment processor to negotiate with.
How to cut what you pay
Start by asking your provider for a breakdown of transaction volumes by card type. That tells you whether blended or interchange++ is likely to be cheaper for you, and you'll need it for every other conversation.
Then negotiate on volume. Providers will often drop rates for operators who consistently process above a monthly threshold. If you have several sites, put them all on one contract.
Same goes for channels. One processor for in-person and another for online orders splits your volume in two, and each half has less leverage. Put everything through one platform and you're negotiating with one bigger number.
Check when your contract ends. If you're still inside a minimum term, work out the exit fee and compare it with what a better deal would save. Sometimes it's worth paying to leave.
And question the terminal rental. £30 a month per device over a 3-year contract is over £1,000 per terminal. Buying outright is often cheaper.
Most of the savings come from knowing your card mix, moving to interchange++ if your customers mostly pay by debit, and getting in-person and online payments onto one platform.
Flipdish offers integrated restaurant POS and payments for restaurants taking orders in-store, online and through kiosks. Book a demo to see what an integrated setup would look like for your business.