Payments for Chimney Sweeps: What Stripe, Square, and the Big Processors Actually Cost You

Chimney-sweep tickets live on two planets: the $250 sweep and the $3,500 relining. Flat-rate processing is tolerable on the first and a tax on the second. Here is what Stripe, Square, Adyen, Chase, Fiserv, Global Payments, and Worldpay actually charge at both ends, why relining deposits need authorize-and-capture, and how financing turns "let me think about it" into a signed job. Rates checked October 2026. Also see Chimney Sweeps, AI for Chimney Sweeps, and Tech for Chimney Sweeps.

The fee table: two planets, one phone

Square: 2.6%+$0.15 in-person, 2.9%+$0.30 online, 3.5%+$0.15 keyed/stored; Stripe: 2.7%+$0.05 in-person, 2.9%+$0.30 online, 3.4%+$0.30 stored. Interchange-plus estimates assume a 0.3% markup.

$250 sweep (in-person): Square $6.65 · Stripe $6.80 · Interchange-plus ~$5

$450 cap install (invoice online): Square $13.35 · Stripe $13.35 · Interchange-plus ~$9.90

$3,500 relining (invoice online): Square $101.80 · Stripe $101.80 · Interchange-plus ~$75.60 · ACH (0.8%, capped at $5) $5.00

$3,500 relining (keyed in on the roof): Square $122.65 · Stripe $119.30 · Interchange-plus ~$90

$6,000 full relining + masonry: Square online $174.30 · Stripe online $174.30 · Interchange-plus ~$128 · ACH $5.00

$122 versus $5 — same relining job, depending on how the card gets taken. At volume: a sweep doing 40 relinings a year at $3,500 = $140,000. Square online: ~$4,072/year. Interchange-plus: ~$3,024/year. ACH where the customer agrees: $200/year. The relining line of business is where the processor decision actually matters — the sweep line is a rounding error by comparison. Every processor rides on payments infrastructure — companies like Finix build the rails moving card money from your customer's bank to yours.

The workflow checklist the big processors fail

• Relining deposits with authorize-and-capture. 30–50% deposit at signing on a $3,500 job: authorize the card now, capture when the crew finishes. Stripe's API does this; their content never tells a sweep how. And it matters: a refunded $3,500 charge costs you the $101.80 fee on Stripe and Square — they keep it. Authorize-and-capture exists precisely to avoid paying fees on jobs that cancel.
• Text-to-pay at the chimney. The sweep invoice and the relining quote leave the roof as texts. Neither big processor ships this as a sweep-ready workflow.
• Financing on relining. Wisetack embeds in Housecall Pro, Jobber, and Workiz — invoices $500–$65,000, 0%–35.9% APR over 3–120 months, and you get paid in full when the job's done. The $3,500 relining becomes "$97 a month" instead of "let me think about it." Put the financing line in the quote the AI sends from the roof.
• The rooftop key-in. No signal, dead reader, you type the card: Square jumps to 3.5% + $0.15 — $122.65 instead of ~$90. Carry a backup reader.
• Account freezes on outlier tickets. Square's aggregated-risk model flags the $6,000 masonry charge on an account that normally runs $250 sweeps. If relining is a real line of business, Square shouldn't be your primary processor.
• Dual pricing. A cash price and a card price, both displayed — legal in all 50 states. Straight surcharging is banned in Connecticut and Massachusetts.
• Never lease a terminal — a $300 reader at $49/month for 48 months is a $2,352 reader. Your phone is the terminal.

The honest verdict on each processor

• Square: fine for the sweep line — simple reader, tolerable rates at $250. Dangerous as your primary processor once relining is real business: the freeze risk on outlier tickets is real, and the keyed rate punishes rooftop payments.
• Stripe: great online; for a roof-based sweep it's a developer tool in a payments costume.
• Adyen: enterprise; no returned calls under ~$1M/year.
• Chase, Fiserv, Global Payments, Worldpay: quote-based, bank-led, zero chimney guidance. Fine if you negotiate hard; miserable if you sign unread.
• Built-in field-service payments (Housecall Pro from 2.59%, Jobber 2.9% + $0.30): convenient, Square-priced, and they carry the Wisetack financing integration that actually closes relining jobs. Fine for year one.
• Interchange-plus via an independent ISO: the grown-up answer once relining passes ~$100k/year in card volume.

Get the ISO quote in writing; ask about statement fee, PCI fee, batch fee, monthly minimum; never sign an early-termination fee. ClaroPro pairs bilingual voice-to-invoice with payments — the sweep invoice, the relining quote, and the text-to-pay link leave the roof together.

How a chimney sweep actually wires this up: notes from Finix's public docs

Finix publishes its developer documentation in the open at docs.finix.com. Translated into a sweep's season:

• Authorize now, capture when done. POST /authorizations holds the 50% deposit on the $3,500 relining — reserved, not taken. Crew finishes: POST /authorizations/{id}/captures. Job cancels: POST /authorizations/{id}/void. No charge-and-refund — refunds cost you the original fee on most processors.
• Payment Links by text — no integration. The sweep invoice and the relining quote go out as links the customer pays from the couch.
• Invoices with partial payments. Deposit at signing, balance on completion — one invoice, not two spreadsheets.
• Refunds cost you twice. POST /refunds returns the money, and Stripe and Square keep the original fee — $101.80 on that relining, gone, even when you did everything right. This is why deposits run on authorizations, not charges.
• Webhooks close the loop. Finix fires an event when the payment settles, so the job is marked paid without anyone checking a bank feed in February.

The catch: Finix is infrastructure — you get its rails through a provider built on top. No-code tools work from the dashboard; API flows need a developer. Test at finix.sandbox-payments-api.com first. More at finix.com; the public docs live at docs.finix.com.

FAQ

Cheapest way to take a $3,500 relining payment? ACH — about $5 flat, 3–5 days to settle. Offer it on the quote; plenty of homeowners prefer it for big tickets.

Should I take deposits on relining? Yes — 30–50% at signing, on an authorization you capture at completion. It commits the customer and protects you from the refund-fee trap.

Does financing really close relining jobs? The $3,500 sticker is the objection; "$97 a month" is the answer. Wisetack (built into Housecall Pro and Jobber) shows 0%–35.9% APR options and pays you in full when the job's done.

Cash discount or surcharge? Dual pricing — legal in all 50 states. Surcharging is banned in Connecticut and Massachusetts.

Will Square freeze my account on a $6,000 masonry job? It's the textbook trigger: an outlier ticket on a small-ticket account. If big jobs are real business, don't make Square your primary.

The processor decision matters on the relining line, not the sweep line: authorize the deposits, capture at completion, offer ACH and financing on the big tickets. Then read Tech for Chimney Sweeps for the stack that runs the reminder engine, and AI for Chimney Sweeps for the seasonal playbook.