Can you add a credit card fee to an invoice?

What the card networks require

• Credit cards only. Debit and prepaid cards cannot be surcharged, even when the client runs a debit card as credit
• Notice before you start: Visa requires you to tell your acquirer — the company that processes your card payments — at least 30 days ahead
• A cap: no more than what card acceptance actually costs you, and never above the network's own ceiling
• Disclosure where the client decides how to pay, and the surcharge shown as its own line on the receipt

Where state law says no, or not like that

The version that works everywhere: a discount for paying another way

Federal law stops card issuers from preventing a seller offering a discount to clients who pay by cash, check or similar means. So instead of adding a fee for cards, price the invoice as it is and offer a discount for bank transfer — Connecticut and Maine, which ban the surcharge, expressly allow the discount. The client who pays by card pays the stated price; the one who pays by transfer pays less.

Why a "card fee" line on every invoice is not the same thing

A line every client is charged, whatever they pay with, is not a surcharge — it is part of your price, and labelling it a card fee when the client paid by bank transfer describes something that did not happen. If the cost of card payments matters to you, either raise your rates by it or use the discount above; both say what they are.

BillingHub takes nothing from your card payments: your client pays through your own Stripe account, and the only fee involved is Stripe's processing fee. An invoice can carry both a Pay button and your bank details, so offering a transfer discount is a sentence in your payment terms rather than a setting.

Make an invoice with both ways to pay