QuickBooks Online Eliminating the $.50 Flat-Fee Bank Transfer (ACH) Payment Processing option

Allow me to ease your frustration, @MaximillianC.

I understand that the current update about the ACH payments can cause you a lot of money. However, the other pricing plan, like the 5-day funding, is no longer being offered. Although this is happening, you can request a rate review to check if you're qualified for a more favorable pricing plan. 

To know what are the requirements for a rate review, you can check out this article: Request a rate review of QuickBooks Payments discount fees. Once you meet all the said requirements, I suggest contacting our QuickBooks Payments Team to process it for you.

Please let me know if you need clarification about this, or there's anything else I can do for you. I'll be standing by for your response. Have a great day.

@MaximillianC 

Our clients are exploring these options to accept ACH payments for free.

https:// melio.grsm.io/quickbooks

https:// veem.grsm.io/veems

Interestingly, I see that they started charging us $1 per check back in March of 2020 instead of the $.50 we had always been charged.  I didn't notice until I checked the statements just now.  

Looking at the published rates online, there is a little question mark next to the "Invoiced" rate of 2.9% plus $.25.  Clicking on that brings up this definition "Sharing an online invoice with your customer, who then pays it using an ACH bank transfer or credit or debit card."  Does that mean that ACH payments made through the Pay Now link on an invoice will now be charged at the credit card rate?  If that is true, that is where the real money grab is happening.

We have continued to be charged $.50 per ACH payment, so I'm not sure where the $1 charges were coming from (that seems odd).  I don't have any reason to think they'll be charging ACH transactions at the CC rate.  ACH and CC are still totally separate, and charged at different rates.  It's just that, as I said, they're charging 1% for ACH payments now, instead of the flat $.50 rate they had been charging some of us, who were still grandfathered in to the much better rates.

Let me chime in and share some insights about transaction fees, @Snowdenfarm.

You can send your invoices for free in QuickBooks Online (QBO). However, fees are drafted when signing up with Payments. This implies that there will be a charge of 2.9% of the total amount + 25c per transaction when your customer pays the invoice (using the link that's attached to it).

The transaction fees also involve a credit card processing service, set up and monthly service fees, discount rates, per authorizations fees, etc. Here's a link for further details: Credit card processing.

I've also added this resource to provide an overview of the fees and plans for QuickBooks Payments: Standard Payment Fees & Rates.

You can also contact our merchant services team if you need more clarifications. They have the tools to open your account in a secure environment and provide you details of your inquiry. 

To learn more about QuickBooks Payments, check out this article: QuickBooks Payments Deposits FAQs

Feel at ease to let me know if you have other concerns with QuickBooks Payments. I'll be around to assist you. Have a nice day.

Does that 2.9% apply when they choose Bank Transfer rather than Credit Card?

Edited to add:  I see the wording has been changed on the website.  It now says the Invoice rate is for when a customer pays with a cc.  I have a screen shot from yesterday where it said cc or bank transfer.  I am glad that was clarified.

Yes, I understand what you are referring to and I am as unhappy with that as you are since I have had to browbeat our customers to use bank transfer rather than cc.  Which is probably why QBO made the change after seeing that we all just switched away from ccs.  BUT, when going through statements as a result of this conversation I see that they started charging me $1.00 per bank transfer a year ago.  I confess that I had never reviewed the statements in the past which is how I missed it until now -- but I will go over then with a fine-toothed comb from now on!!  

I absolutely agree with Maximillian. My customers have been using the "Pay Now" feature with ACH bank transfers (No Credit cards) and getting charged $0.50 per transaction has been reasonable. I also have invoices well over $1000 per transaction and I have over 10 transactions per month. These fees will add up to thousands of dollars per year. Seems a bit excessive for an electronic transfer.

So I just want to point out that the following excerpt from an email I got today from Intuit feels like blatant gaslighting, and just adds insult to injury.  This feels like Intuit had their Marketing/PR department try to put lipstick on a pig.  It feels like they are treating their customers like we are not smart enough to see what's going on, and that just makes this worse:

"Why are we doing this?

Many of you have been asking us for faster funding options to help you better predict and manage cash flow. We've invested heavily in providing ways to make funds available faster and are now rolling out the benefit of next-day ACH to all QuickBooks Payments customers. The ability to access funds faster and automatically reconcile payments in QuickBooks can help you save time so you can focus more on growing your business."

Seriously, Intuit?  You are removing the lower-fee ACH option some QBO customers were grandfathered into because we wanted you to?  I think we all know that's not true.  Which customers was this next-day ACH option not available to, and why would you need to remove the 2-day option for the rest of us to give them the next-day option?  Our company has had the option to change to the next-day option for months now--we just opted not to take it, because getting our money an extra day quicker wasn't worth trading in the low, flat, $.50-per-transaction ACH fee for a 1% up-to-$10 one.  And that's exactly how we liked it--having the choice-- to upgrade to next-day if/when we wanted, or to stick with the $.50 plan if we wanted. Customers always prefer choices over being forced into something, especially when the thing we're being forced into is substantially more costly. 

So please, help us understand, how is you eliminating an ACH option that was saving us and our customers money doing us a favor (like your Marketing team tried to pretend you're doing with the word dance above)?  I hope you can understand my frustration with this.  I'm beyond tired of companies forcing customers onto more-expensive options, and then telling us "we're doing this for you".  If you really value your customers, don't lie to us, and don't take away our choices, unless you have to.  The truth is, Intuit makes a lot more charging percentage fees than flat fees, and you value more profits more than rewarding your long-term customers for their loyalty, by allowing us to stay grandfathered onto the less-lucrative flat-fee plan.  If I'm missing something, please correct me, and I will happily apologize for my cynicism.

Thanks!

I just got off a chat with the rate review people and they offered me a $7.00 per ACH transaction fee. My company has deposited over $200K in the last 3 months with 33 transactions and that is the best they could do. If anybody knows a better payment app or avenue that charges reasonable fees for ACH transfers let me know. I'm not concerned with next day, but of course that is a plus.

@RV8Driver 

Explore the free apps as I mentioned earlier to accept ACH payments for free and integrate it with your QBO account.

https:// melio.grsm.io/quickbooks

https:// veem.grsm.io/veems

As an additional option, you may open a virtual bank account at Wise to deal with multi currency transactions. We may accept ACH payment for free and the wire payment for $7,5 / transaction. Utilize the bank feeds if required.

https:// wise.prf.hn/l/64dl92k

Yes - this is a RIPOFF. 1% for ACH is unheard of. There are other options to process ACH that I had postponed because the 0.50 ACH fee was palatable. Now, I will be STOPPING the use of Quickbooks Online so that I do not have to deal with this increase and other greedy policies coming down the pike for small businesses from Intuit.

As a small business, during these hard Covid times, we absorbed and shared costs with out customers. Intuit on the other hand wants to GRAB everything.  Very insensitive for them to do it at this time and with that steep increase I am sure they will lose many more like me. 

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@spoluru wrote:

Now, I will be STOPPING the use of Quickbooks Online so that I do not have to deal with this increase and other greedy policies coming down the pike for small businesses from Intuit.

@spoluru 

Many options in the market to replace your QBO.

GREEDY CROCKED INTUIT is an expert at blackmail, they provide features and once you are hooked, they change the policies, or they create a "new" plan and you are pretty much forced to fork out the money. I have watched them do this for at least the past 15 years. It is all our fault, we keep using QuickBooks and now with millions of users, Intuit is a monster. I stopped using ACH, there are many services for $0.50 per transaction, even CHASE BANK has a plan for $25 per month, plus $0.25 per transaction after the first 25. 

I understand how the service fees affect your business, @Upset User. That's why I'm here to share further details about this.

QuickBooks Payments implements different rates per payment transaction. With the latest ACH fee, I'd recommend sharing your thoughts by contacting our Merchant Services team. They can review your current rate and provide a more favorable plan in processing your customer payments.

In case you want to know more about payment rates in QuickBooks Payments, you can refer to this article: Accept ACH payments and eChecks. It also answers the most frequently asked questions about processing fees and wire transfers, to name a few.

Also, here's an article that'll further explain charges and the instant deposit feature in QuickBooks Payments:  Standard Payment Fees & Rates.

Please don't hesitate to post again if there's anything else you need about payment processing fees. I'm just around to provide the appropriate information you need.

@Rea_M 

@Rea_M 

This scripted message you've just posted is B.S. Anything more than the INDUSTRY STANDARD OF $0.25 TO $0.50 PER ACH transaction is a RIP OFF, specially when added on top of the ever changing and increasing QuickBooks monthly subscription rates. 

I already took my $150,000 monthly ACH transactions elseware, away from Greedy Crooked Intuit. What Greedy Intuit did is a total abuse of power forcing most of their users to pay them more fees on top of fees, just because they got them locked in into the Intuit QuickBooks ecosystem. These moves by Crooked Intuit should be illegal when so many people are left in the dark.

Hello, customer.

I appreciate your time for continuing to let us know the impact of the changes.

I understand the frustrations that you have in regards to rates per transaction. I'll take note of your experience so we can submit proper feedback to our Management.

Let me give you a bit more context on why we made that change and how it will hopefully benefit you and other customers in the long run.

We had to review our pricing strategy due to industry alignment. We always strive to provide efficient, reliable, and easy to use payment services. To make this happen, we had to set the new fees so we can continually make investments to maintain and improve the product.

I am also looking forward to discussing the situation with you and answering any questions. Feel free to reach out to me anytime.

This ACH increase was the last straw. actively looking for migration off of QBO platform.

been using quickbooks for over 15 years in various businesses 

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@skyviewfarmllc wrote:

This ACH increase was the last straw. actively looking for migration off of QBO platform.

been using quickbooks for over 15 years in various businesses 

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@skyviewfarmllc 

Many options in the market to explore. Contact us to purchase a 3rd party conversion service.

What about using the Q.B. debit Card?  It says no fees if you use this.  I got the Q.B. account, but still getting charged.  Anybody else have issues with this.

Hi, Scott.

I'm here to share with you some information about the QuickBooks Debit Card or Cash account.

When you get a QuickBooks Cash account or a debit card, it's a monthly fee-free checking account within QuickBooks where all of your customer payments get deposited. Meaning, there are no fees for keeping your money in QuickBooks Cash, and you won't be charged for transferring money to or from your QuickBooks Cash account.

If you use instant deposits, there's no additional fee for using your QuickBooks Cash account. However, for other debit cards, the fee is 1%. This is in addition to the regular fees for processing transactions.

These links give you more details about QuickBooks Debit Card. You can skim through each topic to know more:
 

• Use your QuickBooks Cash account
• Learn more about QuickBooks Cash accounts and the Cash Flow menu

On the other hand, here's how you can categorize your banking transactions to put them to the correct accounts.

If you have any other questions about payments or fees, please let me know by adding a comment below. I'm more than happy to help. Have a good one!

Dear Angelyn_T,

I'm not sure you are giving valid information about no fees for Quickbooks cash account deposit transactions. In the least you are misleading this blog's subject of the $0.50 ACH fees being raised to $10.00 (or 1%) which I assure you is absolutely true.

I have a Quickbooks cash account which I think is great, but I am certainly paying $10.00 (as of a week ago) for every invoice that is paid through the quickbooks payment process (for me it's ACH bank transfers) into my Quickbooks Cash Account. I am happy to show you my register where each $10.00 fee for each invoice paid has been debited from my QuickBooks cash account. If there is a no fee way to do this I would love to know and get my $10 fees refunded.

You are very misleading when you write;

"If you use instant deposits, there's no additional fee for using your QuickBooks Cash account."

Because in the very next line you write:

"However, for other debit cards, the fee is 1%. This is in addition to the regular fees for processing transactions."

Well I'm here to tell you that "other debit cards" (which I don't understand how that is possible unless I accept credit cards) includes ACH transactions which is the the only other option besides credit cards that customers can pay through the QB payments. Therefore, if a customer is going to pay me through my quickbooks payment process, I will ALWAYS be charged a fee becuase there are only two options for a customer to pay; ACH transaction ($10.00 fee) or credit/debit card transaction (lots of fees).

Maybe I am missing something, but I understand I can transfer money from/to another bank account to/from my Quickbooks Cash account (done that) with no fees, but deposits from my customers via quickbooks payments (i.e. ACH bank transfers) has a stiff $10.00 per deposit (all my invoices are over $1000). And by the way, while I was using this "instant deposit" service some of my customer payments were deposited within hours to my QB cash account and some still took days. Not really instant on every customer payment.

My question is how can a customer pay me using "instant deposits" without me incurring a transaction fee, becuase from all the material you have referenced, there is no way.

We have the exact same issue. They only gave us a few days' notice, so we didn't have an opportunity to change payment platforms before our last quarterly billing cycle where we issue almost 200 invoices. Now we're paying $10 for many payments that previously cost 50 cents, it's very damaging.

On top of that, they verbally and in writing advertise that if you have 3 months with average processing of at least $7500, they do a "rate review" on your fees. However, in practice they're not applying the advertised "average" but instead applying "3 months with at least $7500 each month." We bill well over that on average (as well as have been using the system for almost 10 years and have excellent standing), but periodically fall below due to our quarterly billing cycles -- in March we fell a little below so they're currently denying us a review, and I haven't yet received a promised call-back from those with authority after a few days.

It's all very scammy.

CHARGING $10.00 FOR AN ACH BANK TRANSACTION, WOW CROOKED INTUIT SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF THEMSELVES.... BUT THEY ARE NOT, THEY THRIVE IN SQUEEZING EVERY PENNY THEY CAN FROM SMALL BUSINESSES, NONE OF THE LARGE BUSINESSES ARE USING CROOKED INTUIT FOR ACH TRANSACTIONS.