Interchange++
explained simply

Published July 2026 · 4 min read

"Interchange++" (pronounced "interchange plus plus") is a pricing model for card payments. Behind the technical name sits the simplest idea in the industry: you pay each component of the fee at its real price, and your provider's margin is shown separately. This guide breaks the model down and teaches you how to read a price list — ours or anyone else's.

The three lines of the model

The name says it all: Interchange + scheme fees + margin.

• Interchange — paid to the cardholder's bank. Capped in the EU for consumer cards: 0.2 % (debit) and 0.3 % (credit). Nobody can negotiate it, not you and not your provider: it's a pass-through cost, identical for everyone.
• + Scheme fees — the share taken by Visa, Mastercard or the relevant card scheme. A few hundredths of a percent, set by the schemes themselves.
• + Margin — what your payment provider earns, in cents and/or a percentage. It's the only line that pays them, and it's written in black and white.

How it differs from a flat rate

A flat ("blended") rate merges the three lines into a single percentage, identical for every card. It's easier to read — but it has two consequences:

• You pay the "average" rate even when your customer uses a cheap card. A local debit card costs around 0.2 % in interchange; if your flat rate is 1.99 %, the difference is never given back to you.
• Your provider's real margin is invisible: there's no way to know what you're paying for the service itself, so no way to seriously compare two offers.

Interchange++ makes the opposite bet: a few more lines on your statement, but every euro traceable. At the same volume, the total is usually lower — precisely because the margin can't hide inside an average.

How to read an Interchange++ price list

Take a typical line: 0.19 € + 0.95 % per online payment with an EU consumer card. On a 50 € basket:

• Fixed part: 0.19 €;
• Variable part: 50 € × 0.95 % = 0.48 €;
• Total: 0.67 €, or 1.33 % of the amount — interchange and scheme fees included for EU consumer cards.

Three habits for comparing properly:

• Run the numbers on your average basket — the fixed part weighs very differently at 8 € and at 80 € (our guide on what a payment really costs covers this in detail);
• Check which cards are covered by the base rate and which carry a surcharge (business cards, non-EU cards);
• Add any monthly subscription to the calculation, then divide by your volume: you get your real cost as a percentage, comparable from one offer to the next.

What to remember

Interchange++ isn't "complicated": it's the same fee as everywhere else, broken down instead of averaged. If a price list looks unreadable, the right test is to ask for the total cost on a typical month of your business. A transparent provider will give it to you in two minutes — ours shows it directly in the calculator on the pricing page.