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You are responsible for understanding and complying with local laws and regulations around handling fees. In some jurisdictions, passing fees to customers may be regulated or completely prohibited.

Passing BitPay's Processing Fees to Customers

BitPay's processing fee is taken as a portion of the total charge of each payment made by your customers. If you choose to pass payment processing fees to your customers, you'll need to calculate the correct amount to ensure you receive the expected amount. In this article, we'll show you how to do that two different ways.

For demonstration purposes, these examples assume payments are in USD using a 2% percentage-based fee and a $0.25 flat fee are charged on each transaction. Your fees may differ. Refer to https://bitpay.com/pricing/ or your organization's contract for specifics.

Calculating the Total Amount to Charge Customers

To pass fees to your customers, you'll need to adjust the amount they're charged before BitPay deducts the processing fee. Here's a step-by-step process to calculate the total amount you should charge your customers:

1. Determine the desired net amount (settlement) that you want to keep from the payment. This is the amount you would receive for products or services.

2. Identify the flat (flatFee) in cents and percentage (rate) fees set for your account.

3. Calculate the gross amount (invoiceTotal) to charge the customer by using the following formula:

   invoiceTotal = (settlement + flat fee) ÷ (1 - rate)

4. Charge the customer the calculated amount (invoiceTotal) and you will receive the net amount (settlement) after BitPay receives, processes, and credits the payment to your account.

Example

In this example, you want to receive $1000 for a product and you want to pass the processing fees to your customer. Your account's fees are set to 2% + 25c for each transaction. To calculate the total amount to charge your customers:

1. Identify each variable in the formula above:

   1. settlement = $1000 or 1000
   2. flatFee = 25¢ or .25
   3. rate = 2% or .02

2. Plug in the values into the formula:

   1. invoiceTotal = (1000 + .25) ÷ (1 - .02) or invoiceTotal = 1000.25 ÷ .98

3. Complete the equation to find the gross amount to charge your customer:

   1. invoiceTotal = 1,020.66

4. By using this formula, BitPay will credit your account with the desired net amount:

   1. invoiceTotal - 25c - 2% of invoiceTotal = 1,020.66 - .25 - 20.41 = 1000

Notes about fees

There are several important notes to consider if you decide to pass fees on to your customers. Consider whether these will negatively impact your business before you decide to pass fees along.

• If your account is charged a flat fee on each transaction, it is always calculated in USD, typically measured in cents.
  • If you are charged 25¢ per transaction, for example, your flatFee above should be .25.
  • Additionally, you must convert this fee to the invoice currency if it is not issued in USD. For example for 1 to 1.1 EURO to USD exchange rate, a €1000.00 invoice would have a €0.23 flatFee, not €0.25.
• Simply adding the fee (2%+25¢) to an invoice will not cover the fee entirely, as increasing the invoice also increases the fee collected. Use the formula described above to ensure you are charging the correct fees.
• BitPay provides shoppers with network fees based on their choice of currency, automatically. These fees are added to the final invoice amount you issue and deducted before the payment is credited to your account, so it is safe to ignore network costs when determining invoice amounts.