Credit Card Processing Audit

America’s #1 credit card processing auditing firm

Your statement is hiding money. We find it.

A credit card processing audit reads every line of your merchant statement against the card networks’ published rates, and shows you exactly what you should be paying versus what you are actually charged.

The first audit is free. We keep none of what we save you. And if you do not love the results in the first 60 days, we give back every penny you have paid.

Get My Free Audit 800-672-1292

Merchant statement Scanning

Interchange — downgraded, non-qualified4,182.60Downgrade

Interchange — CPS retail qualified6,940.15

Discount rate — bundled2,317.44Markup

Assessments — Visa 412.08

Regulatory product fee 289.00Invented

Network access charge 176.50Inflated

Batch settlement 38.75

PCI non-compliance 149.00Avoidable

Interchange rebates on returns 0.00Kept

Monthly minimum 25.00

Recoverable this month $7,610

40%Average overbilling we find

99%Of audits where we find interchange savings

10Points in our proprietary audit

0%Of your savings we keep

The problem

Your statement was not designed to be read

Credit card processing is one of the largest recurring expenses a business carries, and one of the least understood. Statements run dozens of pages, draw on the 640 interchange categories Visa and Mastercard publish, and use inconsistent labels for the same fee.

Processors count on that complexity. It is how a low rate quoted at signup quietly becomes an effective rate twice as high a year later. Downgraded interchange, monthly minimums, PCI non-compliance fees, statement and batch fees, and network or regulatory line items that are really just margin by another name. Individually they look small. Across every transaction, every month, they are one of the most overlooked profit leaks in business.

You should not have to become a payments expert to stop overpaying. That is what we are for.

What we check

The 10-point audit

Every point below is examined against the networks’ published rates and your own agreement. Not a sample. Every line, every month.

Every audit runs through MADR, our Mass Analysis Data Reporting engine, purpose-built for merchant statements. It is why we can review every line item rather than sampling, and it is why we can stand behind the result. How MADR works.

01Correct setupConfirming the right MCC code and interchange flags are in use, and that the correct acquiring systems are in place.

02Processor markupSeparating the true cost of processing from the margin your provider adds on top, so you can see what you actually pay them.

03Hidden and miscategorized feesIdentifying junk fees, vague regulatory or network charges, and line items that do not belong on your statement at all. Our statement decoder explains them line by line.

04PCI compliance statusChecking whether you are compliant, being charged non-compliance penalties, or paying for coverage you do not need. See Easy PCI™.

05Monthly minimums and flat feesFlagging statement fees, batch fees, and minimums that erode your margin regardless of volume.

06Equipment and gateway costsReviewing terminal leases, gateway charges, and software fees for overpayment or redundancy.

07Chargeback and dispute handlingAssessing chargeback fees and whether your setup is exposing you to disputes you could avoid, and why chargeback insurance does not fix the cause.

08Rate historyComparing what you were originally quoted against what you pay now, which is how rate creep gets exposed.

09Interchange rebate recoveryWhen you refund a sale, the interchange you paid on it is supposed to come back. Many processors quietly keep those rebates.

10Interchange Optimization™Interchange is about 90% of processing cost and changes every April and October. Getting it right can take a transaction from 3.25% to 1.95%. More on Interchange Optimization™.

Results

Effective rate, before and after

The effective rate is total fees divided by total volume. It is the only number that tells you the truth, and it is the number an audit moves. Want to try it yourself first? Take the overbilling challenge on a real five-page statement with $80,785.60 hidden in it.

B2B wholesale distributor

$360,000 saved a year

Placed on a B2C gateway that could not pass Level 2 and Level 3 data, with the wrong MCC and interchange flags, so nearly everything downgraded. Re-platforming and correcting the coding fixed it.

Before 3.1%

After 2.2%

B2B services company

$360,000 saved a year

They chose a plug-and-play provider to keep things simple. The statement was easy to read and told them almost nothing. Once we pulled an itemized version: a discount rate over 70 basis points, more than half of transactions downgrading on the wrong gateway, and inflated interchange on top.

Before 4.0%

After 2.3%

E-commerce seller, $20M annual volume

$280,000 saved a year

On a well-known Level 3 gateway, but capturing only basic information to keep checkout easy, so those transactions never qualified for the lower interchange. Their biggest single win came from recovering interchange rebates.

Before 3.5%

After 2.1%

The endorsed processor

$165,000 saved a year

A business signed with the provider endorsed by their industry association, assuming endorsed meant vetted and pre-negotiated. Endorsement deals are marketing arrangements, often with a cut flowing back to the association. This one hid an inflated discount rate, padded transaction fees, and a stack of junk fees. Because it came recommended, nobody had ever questioned it.

Trusted by more publicly traded companies, like:

What makes us different

Most companies never see the leak

Not because they are careless. Because the system was not built for transparency.

×Fees that quietly rise
×Contracts nobody challenges
×A cost center that never gets questioned

The good news is that fixing it is simple.

✓You do not have to switch processors
✓You do not have to disrupt your team
✓You do not have to gamble on a sales pitch

You just need the truth.

We keep none of your savings

Most audit firms take 25% to 50% of everything they save you, for a term of one to five years. We charge a flat monthly fee instead. If we recover $400,000, the invoice is the same as the month we recover nothing.

We also receive no revenue share, referral fee, or commission from any processor, in any scenario. Month to month, no contracts. Compare the two pricing models.

Your risk, in full

Our 60-day guarantee: love the results or don’t pay

Take 60 days. If you do not love what we have done for you, we return every penny you have paid us and release you. Not a credit, not a discount on the next month. Your money back.

It is deliberately not a scorecard against a savings forecast. We regularly find more than we projected, but numbers are only part of the job. The rest is whether we are a good fit for your business, and you are the only one who can judge that.

After those 60 days we are month to month. No contract, no term, no exit fee. Our clients stay because they like what we do for them, not because a document says they have to.

Notice who cannot offer you this. A firm taking 25% to 50% of your savings for the next one to five years has no way to hand it all back and walk away, because the money is already spoken for. A flat fee can. That is not a marketing decision, it is what the pricing model allows.

Same job, different name

Is a merchant processing audit the same thing?

Yes. Merchant processing audit, merchant services audit, credit card processing audit: they all describe the same piece of work, which is reading your processing statements line by line and proving what each charge should have been. The name changes depending on who is selling it. The work does not.

So the thing worth comparing is not the label, it is the pricing. Most firms offering a merchant processing audit keep a share of what they find, typically for the next one to five years. We charge a flat fee and keep 0% of your savings, so the number you save is the number you keep.

It also does not matter whose name is on the statement. Whether you are billed by one of the large processors or by one of the thousands of resellers riding on their platforms, the audit runs the same way. Start with a free statement review and see what is actually on there.

Straight answers

What is a credit card audit?

A credit card audit is an independent review of a merchant’s processing statements to identify overbilling, hidden fees, and interchange downgrades. An auditor examines every line item against the card networks’ published rates to determine what the merchant should be paying versus what they are actually charged.

It is not the same as a PCI audit or a financial audit. A processing audit looks specifically at what your processor charges you, and whether each charge is legitimate, correctly calculated, and correctly categorized.

How long does a credit card processing audit take?

A statement audit typically takes about five business days once the merchant provides their processing statements. Accounts with multiple locations or merchant IDs take longer. weAudit’s first audit is free and requires no contract.

Your side of it takes about five minutes: send one recent statement. Recovering past overbilling runs longer, since that depends on the processor’s response and the size of the claim.

Frequently asked questions

What not to say during an audit?

Do not tell your processor you are shopping or thinking about leaving. That invites a retention offer, which is a temporary rate cut that expires quietly, rather than a correction of what you were wrongly charged. Ask instead for a full fee schedule and a written explanation of every line item.

How often are PCI audits?

PCI compliance is validated annually. Most merchants complete a self assessment questionnaire each year, while the largest complete an on site assessment with a qualified security assessor. Merchants with internet facing systems also need quarterly network scans from an approved scanning vendor. Over 90% of our clients certify in under an hour with Easy PCI™.

How much does the audit cost?

The initial audit is free. We review your statement and deliver a findings report at no cost and with no obligation. You only move forward if the savings make sense for you.

How much could I actually save?

It varies by business, volume, and current setup, but savings of up to 40% or more are common. Because interchange makes up 80 to 90% of processing costs, businesses that have never been audited tend to have the most to recover.

What is interchange, and why does it matter so much?

Interchange is the fee set by the card networks and paid to the card-issuing bank on every transaction. It accounts for 80 to 90% of your total processing cost, which is exactly why making sure each transaction qualifies for the lowest applicable rate is where the largest and most durable savings come from.

How is this different from what my current processor tells me?

Your processor profits from the margin built into your statement, so they have little incentive to point out where you are overpaying. We work independently on your behalf, with no stake in keeping any fee in place and no compensation from any processor in any scenario.

What kinds of businesses benefit most?

Any business accepting cards can benefit, but the biggest recoveries come from B2B and higher-volume operations that have never been independently audited: wholesale distributors, professional services firms, e-commerce sellers, and multi-location businesses. B2B in particular leaves the most on the table, because Level 2 and Level 3 qualification is easy to miss and expensive to overlook.

What happens after the audit?

If you move forward, we recover eligible rebates, correct misqualified transactions, optimize your interchange, and keep watch with monthly audits so the savings hold over time. Everything stays month to month, backed by a 100% love the results or don’t pay guarantee.

Do I have to switch processors or banks?

Usually not. In most cases we optimize and recover inside your existing setup. If switching would clearly serve you better we will say so, but it is rarely required to capture meaningful savings.

What do you need from me to get started?

One recent monthly processing statement. That is enough to begin the 10-point audit, and it is the only thing we ask for before you see findings.

Is there a catch?

No. The audit is free, there is no obligation, and if we find nothing you are under no pressure to do anything. If you do go ahead and the results are not what you wanted inside the first 60 days, our 60-Day Love-The-Results-Or-Don’t-Pay Guarantee returns every penny you have paid and releases you. The only real risk is continuing to overpay by not looking.