Dharma Merchant ServicesB75
Merchant Account (ISO) · Established small and mid-sized businesses, restaurants, B2B sellers and registered nonprofits processing f…
Overview
Dharma posts the number almost every other processor refuses to post: its own margin. Card-present accounts are quoted at interchange plus 0.15% and $0.08 per authorisation, card-not-present at interchange plus 0.20% and $0.11, with interchange and card-brand assessments passed through at cost. The recurring cost is a $20 monthly fee, and Dharma charges nothing for PCI compliance, AVS, batching, annual maintenance or a monthly minimum. There is no term contract and no early termination fee — only a $49 fee to close the account. Third-party sentiment matches the pricing: an A+ BBB rating with almost no complaint history, and 4.4 out of 5 across 141 Trustpilot reviews. The reasons not to use Dharma are all about fit.
Best for: Established small and mid-sized businesses, restaurants, B2B sellers and registered nonprofits processing from a few thousand dollars a month upward, in a low-risk vertical, who want to read their own cost structure rather than be quoted one.
Strengths
- + The margin is published, per industry and per card type, with worked examples showing the full cost of a $25 or $100 sale — almost no competitor does this
- + No term contract, no early termination fee, no monthly minimum, no annual fee and no PCI compliance fee
- + High-volume pricing drops the margin to 0.10% and the monthly fee to $15 at $100,000/month, 5,000 transactions/month, or a restaurant average ticket under $25
- + A+ with the BBB and 4.4 out of 5 across 141 Trustpilot reviews — an unusually clean record for a merchant services company
- + Dharma states it employs no commissioned salespeople and does not lease equipment, removing the two structures behind most processing complaints
- + Nonprofits get a materially cheaper margin: 0.10% + $0.08 in person and 0.10% + $0.11 online, above interchange
Trade-offs
- – No high-risk underwriting at all — if your vertical is CBD, nutraceuticals, firearms, adult, gaming or similar, Dharma is not an option
- – Uneconomic at low volume. Dharma says so itself and refers merchants processing under a few thousand dollars a month to Square or PayPal
- – $$49 account closure fee, and Dharma's own nonprofit page contradicts the rate pages by saying no cancellation fee applies
- – Support is business hours only, and the company is small — its BBB profile lists seven employees
- – Underwriting is slower and stricter than an instant-approval aggregator; third-party reviewers report IRS tax ID verification can add up to two weeks
- – Card-not-present volume funds in two days rather than one, and merchants new to processing can be held to two-day funding for their first few months regardless of how they accept cards
Fees in detail
- Online rate: Interchange and assessments at cost, plus a Dharma margin of 0.20% + $0.11 per authorisation (ecommerce, virtual terminal and other card-not
- International: American Express adds a 0.40% international surcharge and a 0.30% card-not-present surcharge, both passed through by Dharma at cost
- Disputes: $$25 per instance
Standard published rate for a domestic online card payment. Confirm current pricing on Dharma Merchant Services's pricing page.
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