Overview
Ideal For
Small businesses with high monthly revenue
Businesses that use both swiped and keyed-in payments
Business owners that want payment and analysis services in one place
What’s on Offer
Full-service merchant accounts with Worldpay processing
Countertop and mobile card readers
Support for both swiped and keyed-in payments
Subscription pricing with no percentage-based transaction fees
Centralized Stax Pay web platform for managing your accounts
Stax API for custom integrations and development
24/7 customer support via online ticketing system
How Stax Works
Application Process
To apply for Stax, you’ll need to get in touch with the Fattmerchant sales team. You can request a quote online, and a sales representative will call you, typically within the same business day. This offers an opportunity to find out how many different Stax subscription services you’ll need and your approximate total monthly cost.
If you decide to go ahead with Stax, you’ll need your social security number and business license, as well as details about your business’s monthly sales. You can select what hardware and software tools you want to purchase, and Fattmerchant will ship out any hardware within a few days.
What’s Unique About Stax?
Subscription-based pricing
The most unique thing about Stax is its pricing model. Instead of charging a percentage of every sale your business makes, Stax offers a flat monthly subscription. You pay $99 per month, plus a flat fee per transaction. That means that the service has a built-in volume discount: the more payments your business processes, the more you’ll save relative to processors that charge percentage-based fees.
The basic monthly subscription to Stax includes a wide range of features. For example, you can process both swiped and keyed-in payments with PCI compliance built into the software. In addition, Stax comes with Quickbooks integration and online invoicing.
Stax Pay software
Stax also offers an online dashboard, called Stax Pay, where you can monitor your business’s sales data. This requires an extra monthly subscription, and you can select from three different tiers depending on the services you need.
At the top tier, the software includes advanced analytics that breaks down your sales by location and employee. It also offers a one-click shopping cart for e-commerce, inventory management, support for keeping customers’ credit cards on file, and recurring payments.
To be fair, the inventory management and invoicing features built into Stax Pay are relatively basic. There is no support for barcodes or SKUs, and you have to enter invoice details by hand instead of uploading a spreadsheet. Still, it’s very convenient to have these tools right alongside the rest of Stax’s payment features.
For businesses that need even more control over their payments, Stax Pay also includes a built-in API. The API is well-documented, but it’s not a plug-and-play solution like some other payment processors offer. You’ll likely want to enlist the help of a software developer to make the most of this offering.
Transparency
One of the things we like best about Stax is that the company is transparent. The terms of service are published right on the Stax website, so you can review them before you start the process of signing up for a plan.
On top of that, all Stax contracts are month-to-month, and there are no early termination fees. You just need to give 30 days’ notice to cancel your subscriptions.
Stax Customer Support
Fattmerchant offers 24/7 customer support for Stax via an online ticketing system. We found that responses typically arrive within a few hours. The Stax website also has a detailed online knowledge base, although this is more focused on explaining the service’s features than on troubleshooting.
Stax Pricing
Pricing & Special Offers
Stax offers a standard $99 per month subscription that includes payment processing and some essential features like PCI compliance. There are no percentage-based fees on payments, but you’ll pay $0.08 per swiped payment and $0.15 per keyed-in payment.
Stax Pay requires an additional subscription. The Starter plan costs $49 per month and offers a basic reporting dashboard and support for ACH payments. Stax takes a 1% fee on ACH payments, up to $10. The Growth plan costs $89 per month and adds more analytics tools, API access, and Text2Pay support. The Pro plan costs $129 per month and unlocks all Stax Pay analysis features plus inventory management, a one-click shopping cart, and recurring payments.
Subscription
Additional Fees
Payment Processing
$99 per month
$0.08 per swiped payment
$0.15 per keyed-in payment
Stax Pay
$49, $89, or $129 per month
1% of ACH payments, up to $10
Stax also offers hardware payment terminals, but pricing varies by the model you want and based on which subscription plans you sign up for. So, you’ll need to request a quote to find out how much a terminal will cost.
Bottom Line
Stax by Fattmerchant can be a good option for small businesses with high monthly revenue. The subscription pricing model and lack of percentage-based transaction fees mean that payment processing costs are consistent over time. Plus, your business effectively receives a discount relative to other payment providers when processing large transactions.
Stax can also be worthwhile for businesses that want analytics, software integrations, and e-commerce on the same platform. The Stax Pay software makes it simple to accept payments in almost any form and to track revenue across your business. Although some of the features are limited relative to purpose-built solutions, there’s a lot to be said for having all of your payment tools together in a single software suite.
