Blog
Notes from the payments side of the table.
Plain-English takes on processing fees, gateway tech, hardware choices and the small print that costs UK merchants a fortune each year.
19 May 2026
Tied house or free house — which one decides your card fees
A short primer on what brewery-tied means for your payments setup, why it matters more than most publicans realise, and what to check before switching processor.
- pubs
- switching
- tied-house
19 May 2026
Your pro shop, bar and restaurant don't need three separate processors
Most UK golf clubs run separate merchant accounts for the pro shop, the bar and the catering side. The history is fine; the present-day cost isn't. What one consolidated statement actually looks like.
- golf-clubs
- multi-mid
- switching
19 May 2026
Shopify Payments — the math past £10k a month
We already wrote about the headline saving when moving off Shopify Payments. This is the deeper version — what an interchange-plus statement actually looks like for a Shopify merchant at £30k, £60k and £120k monthly card volume.
- shopify
- fees
- ecommerce
19 May 2026
Why most independent hotels read four merchant statements every month
Rooms, restaurant, bar and spa frequently run on different processors with different terminals, contracts and rate creep. One ISO across all four changes the bookkeeping more than the rate cut.
- hotels
- multi-mid
- switching
19 May 2026
A named local contact — what that actually looks like for a Welsh hospitality merchant
London-headquartered processors offer "account management" by ticket queue. A regional payments specialist offers something else. Here is what the difference looks like on a Friday night.
- wales
- service
- switching
19 May 2026
Agent question — place the merchant or sell the box?
New agents ask which processor to anchor on. Our answer is unfashionable — anchor on Clover, but place with whichever acquirer wins. Residual stays the same either way.
- agents
- residuals
19 May 2026
Anatomy of a card statement — what your restaurant is actually paying
A line-by-line walk through a typical independent restaurant merchant statement — what each fee means, where the cliff edge sits, and how to spot mid-contract rate creep.
- restaurants
- fees
- statement
12 May 2026
7 signs it’s time to break up with your payment provider
The quiet ways a merchant account drifts out of alignment with your business — and how to spot it before another year of overpayment.
- switching
- fees
8 May 2026
Why Shopify Payments quietly costs you 25–45% more than it should
A breakdown of how Shopify’s default processing stacks up against a mainstream acquirer once you cross £10k/month on cards.
- shopify
- savings
1 May 2026
A new home for The Payments Expert
Why we’ve rebuilt the site, what’s new, and what’s coming next.
- announcement