What card fees really cost you per litre
Card fees are quoted as percentages, but your margin is earned in cents per litre. Putting the two on the same scale shows why card fees matter so much on a forecourt.
- LitreIQ
Most businesses can build the cost of accepting cards into their prices. A fuel retailer selling regulated petrol cannot simply do that: the pump price is set, and the retail margin within it is set too. Whatever you pay to accept a card comes out of a margin that is fixed in cents per litre. That is why it helps to stop thinking about card fees as a percentage and start thinking about them in cents per litre.
The figures we use
In a presentation to Parliament on 25 March 2022, the Fuel Retailers Association put card transaction costs at about 1.75% for credit cards and about 0.65% for debit cards. At the pump price used in that presentation (R21.60 a litre), it worked these out at about 38 cents per litre on a credit card transaction and about 14 cents per litre on a debit card transaction. (Source: FRA presentation, Parliamentary Monitoring Group.)
Your own rates may be higher or lower, depending on your agreements with your providers. The method below works with any rates: just put your own numbers in.
A worked example
This is a worked example, not a measurement of any real site. It uses round assumptions so the arithmetic is easy to follow.
| Assumption | Value |
|---|---|
| Pump price | R30.00 per litre |
| Share of litres paid by card | 80% |
| Of card litres, share on credit or fleet cards | 40% |
| Of card litres, share on debit cards | 60% |
| Fee on credit and fleet cards | 1.75% |
| Fee on debit cards | 0.65% |
Step 1: fee per litre for each card type
- Credit or fleet: 1.75% of R30.00 = 52.5 cents per litre paid this way.
- Debit: 0.65% of R30.00 = 19.5 cents per litre paid this way.
Step 2: how many of your litres are paid each way
- Credit or fleet: 80% x 40% = 32% of all litres.
- Debit: 80% x 60% = 48% of all litres.
- Cash and other: the remaining 20%, with no card fee in this example.
Step 3: average fee across every litre you sell
- Credit or fleet: 32% x 52.5 c = 16.8 cents.
- Debit: 48% x 19.5 c = 9.4 cents.
- Total: about 26 cents on every litre sold, averaged across all tender types.
In this example, every 10,000 litres sold carries roughly R2,600 in card fees. Multiply by your own monthly litres to see the scale for your site, then compare it with your margin per litre.
Why the mix matters more than the rate
Look at Step 3 again. Credit and fleet cards are only 32% of litres in the example, but they make up well over half of the fee cost. A shift in your customer mix, for example a new fleet account or a drop in debit card use, can change your average fee per litre noticeably even if your rates stay the same. Price rises work the same way: because the fee is a percentage, a higher pump price means a higher fee in cents per litre, while your margin may not move in step.
What you can do about it
- Know your actual rates. Pull your card provider statements and write down the rate per card type, plus monthly terminal rentals and any other charges.
- Measure your mix. Split last month's litres by tender type from your back office reports.
- Work out your own cents per litre using the three steps above.
- Check you are only paying for terminals you have. Rental for a returned terminal is a fee with no benefit.
- Talk to your providers. With your own numbers in hand, you are in a much better position to discuss rates, and to ask about lower-cost ways for customers to pay, such as instant EFT or QR payments offered by licensed providers.
- Think about fleet terms. Fleet business is valuable, so understand what each fleet arrangement costs you per litre before agreeing incentives.
How LitreIQ helps
LitreIQ reads your back office reports and card provider statements, read-only, and shows your card fee cost per litre by tender type, every month and every day. It flags when the mix shifts or when charges appear that do not match your terminals on site. Where it makes sense, it can point you towards lower-cost payment options available through licensed partners, so you can have an informed conversation with your providers.
LitreIQ does not route or process payments, and it never holds card numbers. It simply helps you see what card acceptance is really costing you, in the same units as your margin.
Find your number
To see your own card fee cost per litre, start a free 14-day trial on one site, or ask for a free Profit Protection check and we will work it out with you from your statements.