Our Verdict
If you take mostly UK consumer Visa and Mastercard at modest volumes, Lopay is the cheapest card-reader rate on the UK market: 0.79% to 0.99% in person, no monthly fee, and no contract on the reader itself. The rate advantage is real.
The catch is at the edges. Amex adds 1%, the cheapest 0.79% tier pays out only once a week on a Thursday, and new accounts can face holds of up to two weeks. It is a focused rate play, strong on price and light on integrations, not a deep POS.
See Lopay pricing →Everything below explains the trade-offs in full.
Lopay Card Reader at a Glance
Best For
Lopay suits low-volume UK businesses that want the lowest per-transaction rate with no monthly fee or contract. The detailed fit is in the dedicated best-for section below.
Mobile businesses and market traders who want Tap to Pay at zero hardware cost. If you’re already on Xero, the card integration needs no additional setup.
Not Ideal For
If you take significant Amex or international card volume, the +1% surcharge on Amex can make Lopay more expensive than Square for tourist-facing or premium-spend businesses.
If you need integrations beyond Xero, telephone support for urgent payment issues, or your annual card revenue exceeds roughly £150,000, Lopay is not your strongest option.
Key Facts
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| In-person rate | 0.79% (Essential, weekly payouts) or 0.99% (Standard, next-day) |
| Instant rate | 1.79% via TrueLayer open banking, funds in minutes 24/7 |
| Amex surcharge | +1.00% on top of the base rate; international and corporate cards too |
| Monthly fee | None on reader tiers; Business Terminal is £15/month on a 12-month term |
| Hardware | Bluetooth reader from £24 (in-app first reader); Tap to Pay on iPhone or Android £0 |
| Regulator | Stripe Payments UK Ltd (FCA ref 900461); Lopay itself is not FCA-authorised |
| Verified May 2026. | |
What Is the Lopay Card Reader?
Lopay is a UK card payment service for small businesses, operated by Lopay Ltd (company number 13384279), founded in January 2022 by Richard Carter and Ollie Mahoney, London.
It is not FCA-authorised as a payment institution. Regulatory cover for payment processing is provided by Stripe Payments UK Ltd (FCA ref 900461), which acts as the underlying acquiring infrastructure.
As of May 2026, Lopay has over 50,000 active UK merchants and has raised $7.35M in seed funding. We’d describe it as a well-capitalised startup with legitimate regulatory cover.
Its operating history is shorter than Square (UK since 2017) or Zettle (UK since 2012). If you’re weighing long-term provider stability, that shorter track record is a real factor.
Lopay offers a Bluetooth card reader, Tap to Pay via a mobile app, a Business Terminal on a 12-month subscription, payment links, and a free POS app. Its focus is UK-only; non-GBP transactions attract a 2% FX surcharge.
Fees and Costs
Card Payment Fees
Lopay structures its rates by settlement speed. We’d say this is clearly designed, but the real complexity sits at the edges: Amex, payment links, and FX all carry surcharges that the headline rate does not reveal.
Essential (weekly payouts): 0.79% per in-person transaction. Payouts land every Thursday for the previous week’s takings.
Standard (next-day payouts): 0.99% per in-person transaction. Funds arrive the next working day.
Instant (immediate payouts): 1.79% per in-person transaction. Funds arrive within minutes via TrueLayer open banking, 24/7.
American Express: +1.00% surcharge on top of the base rate for all tiers. International and corporate cards also attract +1.00%.
Payment links: base rate plus 0.49%. This is not clearly surfaced in Lopay’s headline pricing; if you use payment links regularly, factor this into your per-transaction cost.
Hardware Costs
Bluetooth reader (first reader, in-app): £24 plus shipping. Subsequent readers or Amazon purchases: £49.
Tap to Pay on iPhone or Android: £0. You use your phone’s NFC chip directly, with iOS 16 or later, or an Android device with NFC. No separate hardware required.
Business Terminal: £15/month on a 12-month subscription plus £8.95 delivery. Standalone Wi-Fi device with touchscreen and loyalty features. The 12-month commitment applies here despite the “no lock-in” framing in Lopay’s broader marketing.
Monthly Fees and Contract Terms
No monthly fee on reader tiers. No contract for the Bluetooth reader or Tap to Pay plan.
The Business Terminal carries a 12-month subscription contract. We’d call this the one catch in Lopay’s “no lock-in” positioning. Reader plans are genuinely contract-free; the Terminal is not.
If your business trades across currencies, the +2.00% FX surcharge applies. Lopay is built for UK-only businesses; significant international trading is outside its intended scope.
Payouts and Settlement Times
Picking a tier is really a settlement decision: the cheapest rate has the slowest payout, so weigh the saving against your cash-flow rhythm before you choose.
Standard and Essential. On Standard (0.99%) funds settle the next working day to a UK bank account. On Essential (0.79%) they settle once a week, every Thursday, covering the previous seven days: a Friday sale lands the following Thursday, up to eight days later.
If you run a tight weekly payroll and your Friday card revenue is still in Lopay’s payout queue on Monday, you may need a reserve or overdraft to cover wages. The 0.20% saving does not always justify that trade-off.
That’s the catch on the cheap tier.
Instant. The Instant tier (1.79%) uses TrueLayer’s open banking rails to push funds to your bank within minutes, 24/7, weekends and bank holidays included, which standard card settlement does not cover.
We’d put Instant in the emergency cash-flow category: expensive as a default, but genuinely useful when timing matters more than cost. The 0.80% premium over Standard pays for itself if it avoids an emergency overdraft draw.
Card Reader Features
Accepted Payment Types
The Bluetooth reader and Tap to Pay accept Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Apple Pay, and Google Pay.
American Express is accepted at all tiers. The 1.00% Amex surcharge is the cost of that acceptance. If your customer base carries significant Amex volume, model the impact before choosing Lopay over a flat-rate provider.
Connectivity and Portability
The Bluetooth reader (Stripe M2) pairs to a phone via Bluetooth and requires the Lopay app with an active internet connection.
Lopay cannot process a card offline. If your Bluetooth drops or your 4G cuts out mid-queue, the reader is dead until the connection comes back.
Connectivity failures appear in customer reviews with enough regularity that we’d plan around this if you trade outdoors or at events where mobile data is unreliable.
Your reader loses Bluetooth pairing mid-queue at a Saturday market. The Lopay app shows “searching for reader” and the customer is waiting. Restarting takes around 30 seconds. It is an infrequent failure, but one to have a plan for.
Tap to Pay turns a compatible iPhone or Android device into a card terminal with no separate hardware: the lowest-friction entry point for a business just starting out.
Battery Life and Reliability
The Bluetooth reader has its own battery and charges via USB. Battery life covers a typical trading day under moderate use.
If you’re a market trader or event seller who cannot afford mid-transaction downtime, keep a charging cable in your kit. We’d rate Bluetooth reliability as the main hardware variable to plan for. Not a dealbreaker, but a genuine consideration for outdoor trading.
App, Dashboard and Reporting Features
The app punches above its price on the basics and falls short on integrations. For a sole trader that trade-off usually lands the right way; for a multi-site operator it may not.
App features. The free Lopay POS app covers inventory, unlimited team members and sales reporting. If you have a small team, the unlimited staff accounts give you more flexibility than Square’s free tier, which caps staff access.
We’d call the unlimited team members the strongest differentiator on the free tier. Payment links, QR codes and subscription links for recurring billing are all in the app.
Reporting. You get transaction history, end-of-day summaries and sales data, which covers what most sole traders need day to day. For advanced multi-location reporting or purchase-order management, it is limited next to Square or a dedicated EPOS platform.
Integrations. Xero is included; QuickBooks and Sage are not natively supported, so you would reconcile manually or export via CSV. That is a practical limitation to weigh before committing.
For a multi-site operator, that’s the gap.
If your accountant runs your VAT returns in QuickBooks and you switch to Lopay for card acceptance, you’ll reconcile by hand each quarter. Factor that admin time into your cost comparison.
Security, Compliance and Chargebacks
The security model is solid Stripe infrastructure. The thing to actually plan for is the new-account hold, which catches out businesses that sign up days before a big trading event.
Security and PCI. Lopay is PCI DSS compliant: card data is encrypted at the reader and processed through Stripe’s infrastructure, so it never passes through your phone. 3D Secure and Strong Customer Authentication run at the Stripe platform level under PSD2.
Fraud checks and holds. New accounts face holds as part of onboarding verification. Customer reviews document holds of up to two weeks, with requests for bank statements and business documentation before funds are released.
If you’re setting up before a seasonal peak or a big market event, we’d open your Lopay account at least three weeks ahead, submit documentation upfront, and treat verification as part of your pre-trading checklist.
A market trader opens their Lopay account two days before their biggest summer festival. The first week’s takings are held for identity verification. The hold lasts ten days, and the festival has ended by the time the funds clear. Open early.
Chargebacks. Disputes follow Stripe’s standard workflow, with evidence submitted through the Lopay merchant portal. There is no dedicated UK account manager for chargeback support, so for sectors with higher chargeback exposure that is a gap next to providers offering managed dispute handling.
Who the Lopay Card Reader Is Best For
Lopay fits a specific profile, and it fits it very well: low-volume UK consumer-card businesses that value rate over ecosystem.
Best business types. You’re well suited as a UK sole trader, independent retailer or small hospitality business taking mostly UK consumer Visa and Mastercard, wanting the lowest per-transaction rate without a monthly commitment.
Between £2,000 and £150,000 in annual card revenue the rate advantage over flat-rate rivals is meaningful. Below £2,000 the saving is small in absolute terms; above £150,000 IC+ pricing from a direct acquirer typically undercuts every flat-rate provider.
If you’re already on Xero the integration needs no extra setup. That is the profile Lopay fits best: UK consumer cards, Xero accounting, modest volume, low Amex exposure.
That’s the deal in one line.
If you run a mobile beauty business taking ten £50 payments a day, five days a week, the 0.76% saving over Square is roughly £190 over a twelve-week season. That is money that stays in your business.
Best sales environments. Tap to Pay at zero hardware cost suits businesses just starting out, mobile service providers and sole traders who don’t want a separate device. The £24 Bluetooth reader is among the UK’s lowest-cost options for outdoor markets with good mobile data.
When to look elsewhere. Choose Square for a deeper POS ecosystem and no-surcharge Amex, SumUp Air if you take much Amex or international volume, or an IC+ acquirer once you pass roughly £150,000 a year. The head-to-heads below run the numbers.
Customer Support and Reviews
The review signal is strongly positive at 4.6/5 on Trustpilot, with the caveats clustering on two things: connectivity and the absence of a phone line.
Support channels. Support is primarily in-app and by email, with no published telephone number. For straightforward setup questions, in-app help is generally enough.
If your card reader freezes mid-service and you need it fixed during trading, an email exchange is a worse outcome than a brief phone call. We’d call the missing phone line the biggest practical gap in Lopay’s support model.
Review themes. The 4.6/5 rating rests on recurring positives: fast setup, simple onboarding, competitive fees, responsive support for standard queries, and reliable instant payouts. The complaints are narrower:
- Bluetooth connectivity: the reader can lose pairing with the phone, needing a restart mid-session
- Payment stuck authorising: transactions occasionally freeze, with no clear fix through in-app support
- New account holds: up to two weeks with document requests, most disruptive when you set up close to a trading event
Lopay Card Reader Alternatives
Lopay vs Square Reader
Square charges 1.75% flat to all card types with no Amex surcharge. The rate is higher than Lopay Standard for UK consumer cards, but Square’s POS ecosystem is considerably deeper: more integrations, API access, and stronger multi-device support.
We’d choose Square if you need POS depth, multi-location management, or no-surcharge Amex acceptance. Lopay wins on rate for businesses with low Amex volume and straightforward Xero integration needs.
Lopay vs SumUp Air
SumUp Air costs £39 at 1.69% flat, no monthly fee, no contract. The flat rate applies to all card types without an Amex surcharge.
We’d choose Lopay for UK-consumer-card-heavy businesses where Amex volume is low. SumUp wins for mixed card portfolios where you take significant Amex or international cards.
Lopay vs Tide Card Reader
Tide Card Reader is designed for Tide business account customers and offers competitive bundled pricing for account holders. If you already bank with Tide, comparing the combined account-and-reader cost against Lopay is worthwhile.
Lopay is the better option if you do not bank with Tide. Tide Card Reader is better for existing Tide customers wanting a single provider for both banking and card acceptance.
Full comparison: our Tide Card Reader vs Lopay guide.
For a full comparison across all options, see our best card machines for small businesses roundup.
Final Verdict: Is the Lopay Card Reader Worth It?
Lopay is the cheapest card reader for UK businesses taking primarily UK consumer Visa and Mastercard payments at volumes between roughly £2,000 and £150,000 per year. The rate advantage is real.
If your Amex volume is significant, the maths changes. The +1% surcharge means a business taking 15% of revenue on Amex pays a blended rate that closes the gap with Square considerably.
We’d recommend Lopay if you want the lowest per-transaction rate, run primarily UK consumer cards, already use Xero, and do not take significant Amex volume.
If you need stronger integrations, take a lot of Amex, or want phone support for trading issues, Square or SumUp is the better match for your business.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Lopay’s transaction fee?
Lopay charges 0.79% per in-person card on the Essential plan (weekly payouts) or 0.99% on the Standard plan (next-day payouts). Instant payouts cost 1.79%. American Express attracts an extra 1.00% surcharge on top of the base rate.
Is Lopay FCA authorised?
Lopay Ltd is not itself FCA-authorised as a payment institution. Payment processing is handled through Stripe Payments UK Ltd, which is FCA-authorised (reference 900461).
How fast does Lopay pay out?
Settlement depends on your plan. Standard: next working day. Essential: weekly, every Thursday. Instant: within minutes, 24/7 via TrueLayer open banking (includes weekends and bank holidays).
Does Lopay have a contract?
No contract on the Bluetooth reader or Tap to Pay plans. The Business Terminal carries a 12-month subscription commitment.
Methodology and Disclosure
We downloaded Lopay, ran test payments through Tap to Pay on the phone, timed how fast the money landed, and checked the Xero sync. Pricing and hardware costs were verified against Lopay’s own pages in May 2026, alongside Trustpilot merchant reviews.
Transaction rates and hardware prices are as published by Lopay at time of writing. Rates may change; verify current pricing at lopay.com before making a purchasing decision.
Affiliate disclosure. Lopay is not part of the BusinessExpert affiliate programme. This review is editorially independent.
BusinessExpert may receive affiliate compensation from Square Reader, SumUp Air, and Tide Card Reader, which are mentioned as alternatives. Affiliate relationships never affect editorial assessments.