Guides for owners who read the fine print
Long form, sourced, and updated as the numbers change. Every guide carries its dates and its sources, names when a competitor is the right answer, and ends without a hard sell. New guides land here regularly; the research files behind them are cited on every figure.
POS contract red flags: what to find before you sign
Every expensive POS story we hear starts with a clause somebody did not read. Here are the ten that do the damage, what each one looks like on the page, and the
What interchange plus pricing actually is
Interchange plus is the pricing structure this site keeps recommending, so it owes you a plain explanation of what the words mean, what the alternatives are, an
Free POS systems, and what free actually costs
Four major vendors will hand you a restaurant POS for zero dollars a month, and all four are rational businesses. This guide prices what each free offer actuall
Dual pricing and cash discounting, without the hand waving
Done correctly, dual pricing moves most of the cost of accepting cards off a restaurant's books, legally, in all fifty states. Done sloppily, it reads as a junk
What gets published here, and what never will
This section exists to answer the questions owners actually type: contract traps, fee structures, the true cost of free, the mechanics behind the programs reps propose. Every guide follows the site's rules: figures carry a source and a date, conflicts between sources are printed rather than averaged, our commercial interest is disclosed in the byline, and where a competitor wins, the guide says so by name.
What will never appear: content written to fill a calendar, invented statistics, or advice this team would not give across a table. If a guide here ever reads like it was produced rather than written, hold it against us at the about page, which explains exactly who we are and how we make money.
Where to start depends on where you are. Signing something soon: the contract red flags guide, then the draft agreement with a highlighter. Trying to understand a confusing statement or a rate quote: interchange plus explained, alongside the statement walkthrough. Tempted by a $0 offer: the true cost of free, with the arithmetic worked at a real volume. And if a rep has proposed passing card fees to guests, the dual pricing guide covers the mechanics that keep it legal and keep it liked. Each one stands alone, cites its sources, and links onward to the deeper pages it draws from.
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