Contractor payment-processing fees compared

Compare the same payment channel

Price the way you collect, then decide whether the software needs changing. An in-person headline rate is not the rate for an emailed invoice, and a cheap standalone processor does not replace scheduling, dispatch or accounting reconciliation.

Start with a month of collected payments. Separate customer-paid online cards, cards taken in person, cards entered by staff or charged on file, and ACH. Then add optional fast payouts. A percentage without that context is not a useful comparison.

Our worked example puts Jobber only $4.80 below Housecall Pro at $10,000 collected. That is a processing-fee difference, not a reason by itself to move your business. For the wider workflow decision, see Jobber vs Housecall Pro and our field-service software shortlist.

Published card and ACH rates

US rates from provider pricing and help pages; Jobber and Housecall Pro rechecked October 23, 2026. Other providers retain their October 18 checks. Your account’s negotiated or legacy terms can differ.

Provider / plan	Customer-paid online invoice card	In-person option	ACH	Checked
Jobber Payments	2.9% + 30¢	Tap to Pay: 2.7% + 30¢	1%	2026-10-23 ET
Housecall Pro	Standard cards: 2.99%	Standard reader/Tap to Pay: 2.59%	1%	2026-10-23 ET
ServiceTitan	Custom quote	Custom quote	Custom quote	2026-10-18 ET
QuickBooks Payments	2.99%	2.5%	1%	2026-10-18 ET
Square Free invoices	3.3% + 30¢	Tap/dip/swipe: 2.6% + 15¢	1%; $1 minimum	2026-10-18 ET
Stripe Payments	Domestic cards: 2.9% + 30¢, before invoice software	Terminal reader: 2.7% + 5¢	ACH Direct Debit: 0.8%, capped at $5 per payment	2026-10-18 ET

The qualifications matter as much as the table:

• Housecall Pro: manually entered, scanned and saved-card payments are 3.49%. American Express and commercial, corporate and business cards are 3.49% through any method. Tap to Pay adds $5 per active device per month. The online standard-card rate is not its advertised in-person floor (official fee table).
• QuickBooks: keyed-in cards are 3.5%, rather than the customer-paid invoice rate (QuickBooks rates).
• Square: manual entry/card on file is 3.5% + 15¢. Its paid-plan invoice ACH caps and separate API ACH cap do not belong in a Free invoice calculation (Square pricing).
• Stripe: manually entered online cards add 0.5%; Terminal Tap to Pay adds 10¢ per authorization. More importantly, Invoicing Starter costs another 0.4% per paid invoice on top of Payments fees. The invoice fee applies to either payment method in our model. A basic payment link and a hosted invoice are different workflows.

Check dates follow the provider rows. The Jobber, Housecall Pro and QuickBooks calculations use no ACH fee cap because their cited tables state none. Use your account’s fee schedule for your own budget.

ServiceTitan’s official FAQ says it offers custom merchant pricing. We did not verify a published numeric card, ACH or instant-payout rate, so it remains quote-only, not “free” and not ranked in the cost table.

Instant payouts are an extra charge

The regular collection fee and the charge for receiving money sooner are separate. Do not add a fast-payout percentage to all sales unless those sales actually use that service and its fee basis matches your calculation.

Provider	Published faster-payout charge	Checked
Jobber	Additional 1%	2026-10-23 ET
Housecall Pro	Instapay adds 1% to eligible card/ACH transactions	2026-10-23 ET
ServiceTitan	Numeric rate not verified; request a quote	2026-10-18 ET
QuickBooks	Instant deposits: 1.75%	2026-10-18 ET
Square	Instant or same-day external transfers: 1.95% of amount	2026-10-18 ET
Stripe	Instant Payouts: 1.5% of payout volume; 50¢ minimum. Connect pricing differs.	2026-10-18 ET

Jobber’s instant-payout help confirms its additional 1% is deducted from the payout amount, with eligibility and withdrawal limits. Housecall Pro explicitly notes that not every ACH payment is eligible for instant payout. Ask which funds are eligible, what amount the fee is calculated on, and what limits apply. “Instant payout” does not make every unsettled bank payment immediately available.

We would use standard deposits for routine collections and evaluate the fast option against a specific cash need. The monthly examples below use standard deposits and exclude every instant-payout charge.

Monthly processing costs at three revenue levels

Assume $10,000, $30,000 or $75,000 collected per month, with $1,000 per payment. These are illustrative small-shop scenarios, not reported customer results or industry averages. Unpaid invoices are not collected revenue.

Each scenario uses 80% customer-paid online invoice cards and 20% invoice ACH, by both count and revenue because payments are equal-sized. That means 8 card/2 ACH payments, 24/6, and 60/15 respectively. Cards are domestic standard consumer cards; Housecall Pro’s American Express/commercial premium is excluded. No staff-keyed or in-person transactions are included.

We assume the contractor absorbs processing costs. There are no customer surcharges, negotiated discounts, returns, disputes, currency conversion or optional verification charges. Software subscriptions and hardware are excluded. Square uses Free invoice rates; Stripe uses Payments plus Invoicing Starter on every paid invoice. Neither baseline is a complete field-service platform.

Provider / workflow	$10,000 collected	$30,000 collected	$75,000 collected
Jobber Payments	$254.40	$763.20	$1,908.00
Housecall Pro (standard cards)	$259.20	$777.60	$1,944.00
QuickBooks Payments	$259.20	$777.60	$1,944.00
Square Free invoices	$286.40	$859.20	$2,148.00
Stripe + Invoicing Starter	$284.40	$853.20	$2,133.00

The calculation rounds each payment’s percentage fee to cents, adds its fixed fee, applies any published minimum/cap, and multiplies by the payment count. Stripe’s invoice software charge is then added separately.

For a $1,000 Stripe invoice, Payments is $29.30 by card or $5 by ACH after the cap; Invoicing Starter adds $4 either way. Omitting the invoice charge would make that workflow look cheaper than it is. This is not a claim that all Stripe payment methods carry that software fee.

On Jobber, moving one $1,000 invoice from card to ACH lowers the modelled processing charge by $19.30. That can matter more than moving between the closely priced native platforms. It still requires a customer willing and able to pay by bank, plus a collection workflow your office can manage.

Paid plans, custom quotes and your actual ticket distribution can change the result. Large deposits split into stages incur fees per payment; caps are not applied once to your monthly revenue. Do not treat the Square Free or Stripe Starter row as the cheapest possible quote from that company.

Card vs ACH worksheet: keep more of a big invoice

The bigger the invoice, the bigger the bank-payment win. A $10,000 payment costs $100 by ACH on either platform in this model. The same customer-entered card payment costs $290.30 on Jobber or $299 on Housecall Pro. That is money you can keep without changing your dispatch software.

Use these three illustrative invoice sizes for a repair, a larger job and a major project payment. Each row is one payment, in US dollars. The business absorbs the fee; cards are customer-entered online standard domestic cards. Jobber uses 2.9% + 30¢ and HCP uses 2.99%; both use 1% ACH, from Jobber’s pricing and HCP’s official fee table, rechecked October 23, 2026. HCP’s 3.49% Amex/commercial, manually entered and saved-card rates are outside this worksheet.

Invoice paid in one payment	Jobber card	Jobber ACH	Jobber ACH saves	HCP standard card	HCP ACH	HCP ACH saves
$500.00	$14.80	$5.00	$9.80	$14.95	$5.00	$9.95
$2,500.00	$72.80	$25.00	$47.80	$74.75	$25.00	$49.75
$10,000.00	$290.30	$100.00	$190.30	$299.00	$100.00	$199.00

No ACH fee cap is stated in those rate tables, so none is assumed here. A processing limit is different: Jobber sets account-specific per-transaction, daily and monthly ACH limits. Size the collection schedule to your account’s limits before offering a large bank payment.

Your $50,000 month: change the mix, not the software

Assume twenty $2,500 payments, all collected in the same month. The first mix is fourteen card payments and six ACH; the second is six card and fourteen ACH. Because every payment is the same size, the 70/30 and 30/70 splits describe both revenue and transaction count. Round each payment’s fee to cents, then add the transactions.

$50,000 collected / 20 payments	70% card / 30% ACH (14 / 6)	30% card / 70% ACH (6 / 14)	Monthly saving
Jobber	$1,169.20	$786.80	$382.40
Housecall Pro	$1,196.50	$798.50	$398.00

Move eight of those payments to ACH and keep $382.40 on Jobber or $398 on HCP. The gap between platforms is much smaller than the saving from changing the mix. On either platform, fix how you collect before replacing software that works.

These totals cover standard settlement and processing only: no subscription, refunds, disputes, customer surcharges, premium cards or optional instant payouts. Both vendors publish an additional 1% fast-payout charge in the section above; leave it out when using standard deposits. A fee cap, if your contract provides one, belongs on each payment—not once on monthly revenue.

Three ways to get more big-job balances paid by ACH

1. Put bank payment in the conversation at quote time. Say: “You can pay the final balance securely from your bank through the invoice link.” Put that choice beside the payment schedule, then send the link when the milestone is due. HCP lets customers pay from their bank through the invoice link; introduce it while agreeing the job, rather than springing a new method on them at handover.
2. Take the deposit by card; collect the balance by bank. For an illustrative $10,000 job with a $2,000 online card deposit and an $8,000 ACH balance, fees total $138.30 on Jobber or $139.80 on HCP. That saves $152.00 or $159.20, respectively, versus one $10,000 online card payment. These are two separate transactions; the card fixed fee applies once on Jobber. Agree a deposit amount and schedule that fit the job and applicable local rules.
3. Set the invoice up for the payment you agreed. In Jobber, a payment-method threshold can turn cards off above a chosen amount and default larger quote deposits/invoices to ACH, with ACH enabled. HCP provides per-invoice card/ACH toggles in its payment-method settings. Use those controls for agreed bank-payment balances, and give customers a clear alternative if bank payment does not suit them.

For customer surcharges, use the state and card-network rules in the section below. Offering bank payment does not require adding a card surcharge.

Who absorbs the fee, and can you surcharge?

In these examples, your business pays the processing bill. Housecall Pro’s fee table says fees are deducted before the deposit reaches your bank; check your own provider’s statement and settlement treatment. For margin planning, processing is a business cost even if you build it into your prices.

A customer surcharge shifts a charge to the buyer; it does not erase the processor’s bill. Pricing a service to cover overhead, offering a properly structured payment-method discount and adding a credit-card surcharge are different decisions. We would settle the customer-pricing policy before a technician presents the final invoice, rather than surprise the customer at checkout.

Visa’s US merchant surcharge rules, rechecked October 23, require attention to card type, a ceiling of the lower of the applicable merchant discount rate or 3%, acquirer notice and disclosures. Visa prohibits surcharging its debit and prepaid cards, including a debit card run as “credit.” Its cash-discount guidance also makes clear that renaming an added card fee does not automatically make it a cash discount.

Rules vary by state and card network. For example, New York Attorney General guidance says merchants must display the higher card price or both card and lower cash prices; merely posting an added percentage is insufficient. That is an illustration, not a nationwide compliance checklist.

Have your processor and a qualified adviser review the current location rules, card types, price display and merchant agreement for any customer fee you plan to use.

Our verdict and statement-review checklist

Already using Jobber or Housecall Pro: we would first check whether staff are selecting the right payment channel and whether ACH suits larger invoices. In our $75,000 example, the processing difference between those two is $36 before software and operational costs. Do not let that number outweigh a workflow that reliably records and reconciles payments.

Using QuickBooks for receivables: its published rates are a useful direct benchmark. Price the payment collection and bookkeeping workflow together; it is not automatically a replacement for a dispatch platform.

Considering Square or Stripe: compare the specific invoice plan and collection channel, then include the software fees that workflow triggers. A payment-API headline is not an invoice quote. Get ServiceTitan’s account-specific schedule before comparing it numerically.

For your next statement review:

1. Match collected volume and payment counts to the invoice, in-person, keyed/saved-card and ACH categories.
2. Check percentage fees, fixed fees, per-payment caps/minimums and premium-card treatment against your own schedule.
3. Separate instant payouts, software, verification, disputes and returns from the base processing bill.
4. Confirm your customer-pricing policy independently of the processor comparison.

The examples use the stated monthly assumptions and exclude subscriptions, account-specific pricing and unpriced ServiceTitan rates. Compare your contract and statement with those inputs to build your own budget.

If the subscription decision goes beyond transaction rates, compare the Jobber vs Square booking-to-job workflow. It distinguishes appointment and invoice tools from managing separate field visits, with subscription budgets alongside the workflow checks.

For the customer-facing payment flow, see Jobber Client Hub vs Housecall Pro customer portal: saved cards and bank details, invoice links and the settings that make them visible.

Once the invoice is out, use our Jobber vs HCP overdue invoice reminder guide to set the follow-up cadence, make payment easy and stop chasing paid bills.