Card fees · Australia
EFTPOS fees in Australia, and what the machine costs you a year
Terminal rates look almost identical on a pricing page - 1.4%, 1.6%, 1.7%. Across a year of turnover those decimals are worth thousands. Here is what each provider publishes, and what it adds up to.
Published card-present rates
| Provider | In-person rate | Monthly fee | GST | Published rates |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Zeller | 1.4% | $0 | Includes GST | Source |
| Tyro | 1.4% | $29/mo | Includes GST | Source |
| Square | 1.6% | $0 | GST treatment not stated | Source |
| Stripe | 1.7% + A$0.10 | $0 | Includes GST | Source |
Rates as at 14 August 2026, taken from each provider's own published pricing. Hardware is excluded: Zeller's terminal is bought outright, Tyro's fee shown is a monthly rental, and terminal prices move with promotions.
The two numbers that decide it
Rate versus monthly fee. A lower rate with a monthly fee beats a higher rate with none only above a certain turnover. Tyro publishes 1.4% plus $29 a month for Pro; Zeller publishes 1.4% with no monthly fee. On the published in-person rates those are the same percentage, so the $348 a year of monthly fees is the whole difference - and Tyro's case for it rests on integration with over 450 POS and PMS systems and on business banking features, not on the headline rate. Square publishes 1.6% with no monthly fee on its free plan. Against Zeller's 1.4%, that 0.2 point costs about $200 a year per $100,000 of card turnover.
Your average ticket. Stripe's in-person pricing carries a fixed A$0.10 per transaction alongside its 1.7%. On a $100 ticket that is a tenth of a percent; on a $12 coffee it is more than three times that. Fixed per-transaction fees are invisible on a pricing page and brutal in a high-volume, low-ticket business.
Least-cost routing is worth asking about
Most Australian debit cards carry two networks. Least-cost routing - providers give it different product names - sends a contactless debit tap down whichever network costs you less. Whether it is switched on, and what it saves, depends on your provider, your card mix and your plan, and providers are careful not to guarantee a figure. It is a question worth putting to yours in writing, particularly before October, alongside asking what your effective rate has actually been over the last three months.
Read the detail per provider: Zeller · Tyro · Square · Stripe.
Once you know the number, the next question is what you do about it
BookMyVenue is booking, ordering and POS software with published pricing and zero commission on every booking. It does not replace your payment provider and it does not change your processing rate - but it does mean the software sitting on top of those payments costs a flat monthly fee instead of a slice of every sale.