Pricing modelsCredit card processing audits

Audit pricing, explained by an auditor

What does a credit card processing audit cost?

Flat fee or percentage of savings: those are the only two ways an audit firm can charge you, and which one is better for you depends on numbers you can work out in about a minute.

Independent credit card processing audit firms commonly charge a contingency fee of 25% to 50% of the savings they find, held for a term of 12 to 60 months. The rest, including us, charge a flat monthly fee and let you keep all of the savings. Two firms can find the exact same overbilling on your merchant statement and bill you wildly different amounts for it. The difference is not skill. It is how they decided to get paid, and how long they get to keep getting paid.

Here is the honest version of that comparison, including the cases where a percentage of savings is the better deal for a merchant. There is a break-even calculator below. Put your own numbers in it.

How credit card processing audit firms charge

Every credit card processing audit firm in the country prices one of two ways. Everything else is a naming choice.

Model one

Flat fee

You pay a fixed amount, usually monthly, set by your processing volume and how complicated your account is. The number does not move when the audit finds something big. If the firm recovers $400,000, the invoice is the same as the month it recovered nothing.

You keep 100% of what is found. The fee is a known, budgetable line item.

A note on the word “gain share.” Merchants often ask us whether gain share is a third option, separate from a percentage of savings. It is not. Gain share is what the expense reduction and procurement world calls taking a cut of realized savings over a defined term. Same model, different vocabulary. If a firm quotes you gain share, contingency, or a success fee, ask what percentage and for how long, and you are back to the comparison on this page.

Run your own numbers

Flat fee vs. percentage of savings: the break-even point

Neither model is better in the abstract. Which one costs you less depends on how much the audit finds and how long the agreement runs. Move the sliders.

Cost comparison Illustrative only. Not a quote.

Savings found, per month$2,500

What the audit takes off your monthly processing cost.

Their share of the savings40%

Flat monthly fee$95

Enter whatever flat fee you are being quoted. This slider is not our price list.

Length of the agreement36 months

Contingency agreements commonly run 12 to 60 months. Ask before you sign.

Total savings over the term $90,000 $30,000 per year

Total paid, flat fee $3,420

Total paid, % of savings

Break-even $238 / mo Find less than this each month and the percentage deal costs you less. Find more, and the flat fee does.

The break-even math fits on a napkin. Divide the flat fee by their percentage. A $95 flat fee against a 40% share breaks even at $238 a month in savings. Below that line, the percentage firm is cheaper for you. Above it, every additional dollar found is a dollar the flat fee firm hands you and the percentage firm splits with you.

Which is why the model matters most on the accounts where the audit finds the most. The merchants with the worst overbilling, the ones with the most to recover, are the ones a percentage deal charges the most.

What a percentage of savings gets right

It is not a scam, and we will not pretend it is. Percentage pricing exists because it solves a real problem, and for some merchants it is the better choice.

It removes your downside. If the firm finds nothing, you owe nothing. For a merchant who has been burned before, or who cannot get a line item approved without proof it pays for itself, that matters.

It is cheap on small accounts. A merchant with modest card volume has less to recover in absolute dollars. A percentage of a small number stays a small number. A flat fee does not shrink the same way, which is why ours is set by volume and complexity rather than being one price for everybody.

The firm has to perform to get paid. That is genuine alignment, and it is the strongest argument in the model’s favor.

The case against it is not that it is dishonest. It is that it gets expensive exactly when the audit works, that the terms deciding what you owe are often the least examined part of the agreement, and that the invoice frequently outlives the work.

So how does a flat fee answer “no savings, no cost”?

That promise is the strongest thing percentage pricing has to say for itself, and it deserves a straight answer rather than a slogan. Here is ours.

Before you pay anything The first audit is free

You see what is actually on your statement, in writing, before a dollar changes hands. The risk that “no savings, no cost” is designed to remove is already gone at that point. If we find nothing worth fixing, we will tell you, and you will have paid nothing to find out.

Your first 60 days Every penny back, and we set you free

Our 60-Day Love-The-Results-Or-Don’t-Pay Guarantee is not a scorecard against a forecast. We regularly find and deliver more than we projected, but this is about more than numbers. It is about whether we are a good fit for you. Take 60 days, try us out, and if you do not love us, and yes, we mean love us, we give back every penny you have paid and set you free.

Every month after that We earn your business again

Month to month. No contract, no term, no exit fee. Our clients are with us because they love what we do for them, not because a document says they have to be. A percentage agreement normally buys its zero-upfront offer with a commitment of three years, five years, sometimes the life of the account. That is the trade, and it is rarely presented as one.

“No savings, no cost” answers month one. It does not answer months 13 through 60. Most business owners we talk to are not afraid of paying for the work. They are afraid of being locked into something they cannot leave when it stops being worth it. Ask what the risk-free promise costs you in years, not in dollars.

It is not complicated. We treat business owners the way we would want to be treated.

The part nobody explains up front

What a monthly merchant statement audit is actually for

Here is something we hear from clients a year in: “you did not find anything this month.” It is a fair thing to say and it is worth answering properly, because it exposes what you are actually buying in either model.

The first audit is where the big findings are. After that, the savings are already in place. Your effective rate is down, the junk fees are gone, the interchange categories are set correctly, and nothing on the statement looks dramatic anymore. Merchants read that stability as nothing happening. What is actually happening is that the savings are holding.

Processing accounts drift. Interchange categories change constantly. Processors reprice. New fees appear on line 40 of page 6. Locations get added, gateways get reconfigured, and a card mix shifts a few points. Any one of those quietly puts back what the first audit took out.

The monthly audit exists to catch that. It is not a search for a new headline every 30 days. It is the reason the first headline still holds three years later.

Both models charge you in a quiet month, and merchants should understand why before they sign either one. A flat fee firm bills the same amount to keep the savings in place. A percentage firm usually keeps collecting its share of the savings already achieved for the full term, whether or not it found anything new. Neither of those is a trick. Both are worth asking about out loud.

Flat fee vs. percentage of savings, side by side

	Flat fee	Percentage of savings
What you pay	A fixed amount set by volume and account complexity	A share of measured savings, typically 25% to 50%
Cost when the audit finds a lot	Unchanged	Rises with the size of the win
Cost in a month with no new findings	Unchanged. You are paying for the savings to stay in place, not for a new headline	Their share of the savings already in place normally continues for the full term, found or not
Length of commitment	Set by the agreement, not by the model. Ask. Ours is month to month	Commonly 12 to 60 months, and the share can survive cancellation
Budgeting	One predictable line item	Variable, and hardest to predict in month one
If your volume grows	Reset only if the account materially changes	The savings figure grows, so the invoice grows with it
Who defines success	You do. The firm is paid either way, so the incentive is to keep you	The savings calculation does, which is why its definition is the whole negotiation
Best fit	Merchants with real volume, real complexity, or real overbilling to recover	Merchants with small card volume, or who cannot approve any spend without proven return

The number merchants forget to ask for

It is not just what you pay. It is for how long.

Every conversation about audit pricing focuses on the rate. The rate is half the price. The other half is the term, and the term is where a reasonable-sounding percentage turns into a number nobody modeled.

Month to month You can leave

The firm has to earn the next 30 days. If the work stops being worth it, so does the invoice. Your leverage never expires, which is the only leverage that actually disciplines a vendor.

Locked in for 3 to 5 years You cannot

The work was front-loaded into the first 90 days. The obligation runs for another 33 to 57 months. On a 40% share of $2,500 a month, a five-year term is $60,000, and most of it is owed for savings that were found once.

These are not numbers we invented to make a point. P3 Cost Analysts states on its own merchant processing audit page that it shares in savings each month for a finite period, and puts that period at 12 to 60 months depending on the level of service (costanalysts.com, as of August 2026). Independent write-ups of the fee-audit market describe contingency pricing running from a quarter to half of documented savings. The terms are public. Most merchants simply never think to ask how long they run.

Get three things in writing before you sign anything, in either model: the length of the term, whether the obligation survives cancellation, and what it costs to get out early. A firm that will not put those three in writing has told you what you needed to know.

Read this before you sign either one

In a percentage deal, the definition of “savings” is the price

With a flat fee, the number on the agreement is the number you pay. With a percentage, the number on the agreement is only a multiplier. What it multiplies is defined somewhere else in the document, and that definition is what actually sets your cost.

These are the clauses that decide it, and they are worth reading twice:

01What is the baseline, and who calculates it?Savings are measured against a “before” number. If that baseline is built from a single high month, or from an annualized snapshot, the savings figure inflates and so does the invoice.
02Realized savings, or projected savings?Some agreements bill on savings actually observed month by month. Others bill on a projection made at the start. The second means you can owe on savings that never materialized.
03How long does their share run, and does it survive cancellation?Twelve months and “the life of the account” are very different prices. Ask specifically whether the share continues after you terminate the engagement, and what the early exit costs.
04Do savings you did not cause still count?Interchange categories change constantly, and processors reprice accounts on their own. If the language is broad enough, a reduction that had nothing to do with the audit can still be billable.
05Do you get the raw statements and the working file?If you cannot reproduce the savings calculation yourself from source documents, you cannot audit the auditor.
06Does the firm receive anything from a processor?Residuals, referral fees, or revenue share from a processor sit on the other side of the table from you. This question applies to flat fee firms just as hard. Ask it either way, and ask for the answer in writing.
07If the fee is not published, what sets it: the work, or your savings?Large and complex accounts get quoted rather than listed, and there are good reasons for that. The question is what the quote is built from. A price built from the scope of the work is a fee. A price built from how much a firm expects to save you is a percentage wearing a different coat.
08What happens in a month when nothing new is found?Ask both kinds of firm this one. You are looking for a straight answer about what you are paying for after the first big win, and whether anyone is still actively reviewing your statements.

One more thing worth saying plainly. Credit card processing is a non-regulated industry. No license, no certification, and no regulator stands behind anyone auditing your statements, and that includes us. Nothing protects you here except the agreement you sign and the record of the firm you sign it with. Verify both.

Where we stand

How weAudit.com prices, and why

We charge a low fixed monthly fee, set by your processing volume and the complexity of your account. Never a percentage. Never an “advisory fee.”

For merchants processing up to $5 million in annual card volume, the fee is published on this website. You can see it before you talk to anybody. Above $5 million we quote, and we will tell you exactly why. At that size an account is rarely one account. There are usually multiple locations, multiple merchant IDs, several gateways, and a mix of card-present and card-not-present traffic that has to be looked at line by line before anyone can honestly say what the work involves.

It is worth knowing what that threshold really represents. Most of our clients are B2B, where cards are only a slice of total revenue. A company running $5 million a year through cards is often a $50 million business. The card volume understates the company, and the complexity behind it is real.

What never changes is the model. Quoted or published, it is a flat monthly fee for the work. It is not a percentage, it is not indexed to what we save you, and it does not grow because the audit went well.

The feeLow fixed monthly amount based on volume and complexity. Published up to $5 million in annual card volume. Quoted above it, still flat, never a percentage.

You keep the savingsAll of them. Including recovered overbilling. Our fee is identical whether we find $500 or $500,000.

The initial audit is freeYou find out what is on your statement before you spend anything. There is a one-time implementation fee only if you decide to move forward.

CommitmentMonth to month. No contracts, no term, no early exit fee. We have to earn your business every month, which is exactly how it should work.

Processor compensationWe receive no revenue share, referral fees, or commissions from any processor, in any scenario. Our fee is the same whether you stay, renegotiate, or switch.

60-Day Love-The-Results-Or-Don’t-Pay GuaranteeSixty days to decide whether you love working with us. If you do not, we refund every penny you have paid and set you free.

We are partially owned by an attorney, and we apply the principle an attorney applies: never represent two parties whose agendas conflict. We represent the merchant. That is the whole client list.

Straight answers

Common questions about audit pricing

How much does a credit card processing audit cost?

It depends entirely on the model. A contingency firm typically costs 25% to 50% of everything it saves you, for 12 to 60 months, which on a real recovery runs into five and six figures. A flat fee firm costs a fixed monthly amount regardless of what it finds. Our fee is published on this site for merchants processing up to $5 million in annual card volume, and quoted above that. Either way, the initial audit itself should be free. If a firm wants money to look at your statement, keep shopping.

What percentage do credit card audit companies take?

Most contingency firms land somewhere between 25% and 50% of documented savings. Fifty percent is common enough that you should assume it until you see the number in writing. The percentage alone does not tell you the price, because the term multiplies it. A 40% share for five years costs far more than a 50% share for one.

What is gain share pricing?

Gain share is what the expense reduction and procurement world calls taking a cut of realized savings over a defined term. It is not a separate model. Gain share, shared savings, contingency, success fee, and performance fee all describe the same arrangement: a percentage of savings, for a period of time.

Is a merchant statement audit free?

The initial audit usually is, in both models, because it is how a firm shows you it found something. What is not free is what comes after. That is the part worth reading closely. Ours is free with no obligation, and you can send a statement here.

Do credit card audit firms lock you into a contract?

Contingency firms generally have to, because their revenue depends on collecting a share of savings over time. Terms of 12 to 60 months are standard, and the obligation can survive cancellation. Flat fee firms vary, so ask. We are month to month with no term and no exit fee.

Do audit firms get paid by credit card processors?

Some do, through residuals, referral fees, or revenue share, and it is not always disclosed. It matters, because a firm paid by a processor is being paid by the company whose bill it is auditing. Ask for the answer in writing. We receive nothing from any processor in any scenario.

Is a flat fee or a percentage of savings cheaper?

Divide the flat fee by their percentage. That is the monthly savings figure where the two models cost the same. Below it, the percentage deal is cheaper. Above it, the flat fee is, and the gap widens every month the audit keeps working. Merchants with the most overbilling to recover are the ones a percentage deal charges the most.

Related reading: what credit card processing actually costs, and the hidden dangers of dealing with processing audit companies. If you are comparing specific firms, we publish side-by-side pages on Verisave, Merchant Cost Consulting, P3 Cost Analysts, and CardFellow.

Start with the numbers, not the pitch

Find out what is actually on your statement

The initial audit is free, whichever pricing model you end up choosing, and whoever you end up choosing it from. Send us a statement and we will show you what we find.

Get your free audit Already working with a percentage of savings firm? Bring us the agreement along with the statement. We will tell you what their savings definition actually says, how long their share runs, and whether their deal is the better one for your volume.