When you're getting paid online through Bonsai, it's important to understand the different payment methods we support and the fees associated with them. We offer a variety of online and offline payment options to ensure you receive your payments efficiently.
Note: Bonsai makes it easy to pass the payment processing fees onto your client so you receive exactly the amount you invoiced.
Bonsai Payments
Bonsai Payments is available for users in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia. This method is deeply integrated with Bonsai, offering faster payouts and a smoother client experience. It allows payments via credit card, debit card, and bank transfer (ACH).
Credit and Debit Cards (Visa, Mastercard, Maestro, Discover, JCB, Diners Club, UnionPay): 2.9% + $0.30.
American Express: 3.25% + $0.30.
Bank Transfer (ACH): 1% ($1 minimum).
Instant Payouts: Additional 1.5% fee included
Stripe Payments
Stripe Payments can be used in any country where Stripe is supported and can be directly integrated with your existing Stripe account.
Note: For US users, Bonsai Payments is activated by default as a payment option, so you'll first need to deactivate it (Payments -> More actions -> Deactivate Account) in order to be able to set up Stripe Payments.
Credit and Debit Cards: 2.9% + $0.30.
American Express: 2.9% + $0.30.
Bank Transfer (ACH): 1.0% ($1 minimum)
PayPal
PayPal's fees typically are 2.9% + $0.30, though they may vary by country. More information about their fees can be found on Paypal's official website here.
Third-party platform fee
In locations where Bonsai Payments is available, utilizing other payment processors, such as Stripe Payments or PayPal, will result in an additional 1% platform fee being added to the payout amount. For processing American Express cards using Stripe Payments, the platform fee is 1.35%.
Foreign exchange (FX) fee
The Foreign Exchange (FX) fee is a fee that is added to your Bonsai Payments or Stripe Payments invoices when you get paid internationally using one of our online payment methods. This fee is 2.5% of your invoice amount.
You can learn more about the FX fee and when is it effective, in detail here.
Why are there fees associated with my transactions? These fees are primarily due to the costs charged by payment networks like Visa, MasterCard, and American Express. Bonsai passes these costs through to ensure seamless and secure transactions.
'Other' payment methods outside Bonsai
Other payment methods outside of Bonsai, such as wire transfer and mailed check, are not integrated into Bonsai's platform so any invoice template you send will not automatically be marked as paid upon completion.
If you decide to use these options, Bonsai will simply display the information to your client and you will need to mark your invoice as paid.
In order to use these offline payment options, you need to enable the below setting on the Invoice Settings page here: https://app.hellobonsai.com/settings/payments
Upon enabling this option, you can name it as Bank Account, etc to input your instructions to the client to do a wire. Then, these instructions do show up to your client at the time of paying your invoice, under the available payment methods.
Note: There are no fees associated with utilizing 'Other' payment method options on your Bonsai account.