View Square’s average merchant service fees
About average merchant service fees
Square publishes average merchant service fees for card payments processed in Australia each quarter. We publish this information to meet the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) fee transparency requirements.
These figures show historical averages across groups of Square sellers, including sellers on standard and custom pricing. An average may therefore be lower than Square’s advertised standard processing fee for a particular payment type. Your agreed processing fees continue to apply. For information about your own fees, refer to your pricing agreement where applicable and Square Dashboard.
July-September 2026 (Q3 2026)
The table below shows average merchant service fees for payments processed from 1 July to 30 September 2026. Figures exclude GST and are expressed as a percentage of the value of payments processed.
| Merchant Categories | Average Merchant Service Fee (%) | |
|---|---|---|
| All Direct Merchants | 1.34% | |
| Domestic (card present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.30% |
| Credit | 1.29% | |
| Domestic (card not present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.68% |
| Credit | 1.71% | |
| International | Debit & prepaid | 1.30% |
| Credit | 1.36% | |
| Small Merchants | 1.47% | |
| Domestic (card present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.42% |
| Credit | 1.42% | |
| Domestic (card not present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.86% |
| Credit | 1.89% | |
| International | Debit & prepaid | 1.47% |
| Credit | 1.56% | |
| Medium-sized Merchants | 1.17% | |
| Domestic (card present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.14% |
| Credit | 1.13% | |
| Domestic (card not present) | Debit & prepaid | 1.45% |
| Credit | 1.37% | |
| International | Debit & prepaid | 1.19% |
| Credit | 1.20% | |
Understand the figures
How we calculate the averages
For each category, we divide the total merchant service fees charged by the total value of the relevant card payments. We express the result as a percentage, rounded to two decimal places. Payments with a higher value have more influence on the average.
Merchant categories
These categories use the value of card payments processed through Square in the 12 months ending with the reporting quarter:
All Direct Merchants: All sellers covered by this report, across all business sizes.
Small Merchants: Sellers processing less than $1 million.
Medium-sized Merchants: Sellers processing between $1 million and $10 million.
For related businesses assessed together, the thresholds apply to their combined card payments. For newer sellers, we may also use quarterly payment thresholds to determine their category, in line with the RBA’s rules.
Payment types
Domestic: Payments made with cards issued in Australia.
International: Payments made with cards issued outside Australia.
Card present: In-person payments where a card or digital wallet is read by a payment device.
Card not present: Other card payments, including online and manually entered payments. Payments completed online through a QR code or website link are included in this category.
Previous reporting periods
July-September 2026 (Q3 2026) is the first reporting period. Earlier reports will be linked here as new quarterly reports are published.