6 ms·

100%. Stripe is a blackhole. For my current project, I pay nearly 5-7% on each transaction to Stripe. For my next project, I'm implementing custom billing and

100%. Stripe is a blackhole. For my current project, I pay nearly 5-7% on each transaction to Stripe. For my next project, I'm implementing custom billing and using Stripe just as a payment processor.

moralestapia 2y ago
Can you (and GP, and others in the thread) suggest alternatives? I'm about to work on payments for a new product, would like to try something new!
- chucky123 2y ago
  i don't use a 3rd party billing solution. I straight up created my own. If you have a single type of pricing(eg, variable, or tiered) its very easy rolling your own. The issues happen when you change from variable to tiered(or vice versa), change from anniversary to calendary dates, add coupons, per user custom pricing, credits, etc etc. I don't recommend building your own if you aren't familiar with Stripe or any other billing system. Once you understand how billing works, feel free to make a custom billing solution.
  - Rafsark 2y ago
    You are right! The issues usually happen when you add more complexity (tiers, discounts, credit notes, coupons, prepaid credits). Also, what I find very tough is that this is not a « one stop shop »: every single company has it’s own definition of what should be included or excluded from the MRR. I am pretty sure you never end up on an universal definition
  - ankit77 2y ago
    I started OpenPay (getopenpay.com) as an alternative to Stripe. We're giving subscription management for free to the HN community for a year We support all the edge cases you mentioned around variable/tiered pricing, coupons, etc all part of our solution
- j33zusjuice 2y ago
  Have you already looked here? https://alternativeto.net/software/stripe/ https://alternativeto.net/software/stripe/ I don’t run any commerce sites, myself, but is there a big difference in using stripe vs a more traditional processor, like working with CardPointe or something?
- internetter 2y ago
  I'm seriously considering https://www.paddle.com/ https://www.paddle.com/. For 5% + $0.5, they promise that you'll never need to worry about - Chargebacks - Global tax compliance - Billing support - Fraud - Subscription management Their API is... worse... and it is expensive... but mathing it out it is like 1% for all that peace of mind. Feels worth it.
  - ensignavenger 2y ago
    Until you build out your business around their API and processes, and they decide to start charging more... and more.. Obviously you need to use some third party services, but as soon as your business is viable, always be preparing the ability to switch to competitors.
  - jokethrowaway 2y ago
    Paddle is pretty bad. Support is bad in general, the API is bad, you never win a chargeback (you still have to worry about chargebacks). I wanted to try lemonsqueezy but now it's been acquired by stripe, so it will likely turn into another expensive Death Star. MoR solutions are a good idea; the tax (F*K VATMOSS Europe) / accounting overhead is likely not worth it. Having a single B2B transaction whenever you want is much easier to deal with. When your income is large enough that the % you'd be saving let you afford developer time to implement and maintain taxes / billing and extra for accounting of thousands of transactions, then go for it and switch to a cheaper solution. Let's say you make 100k per year: the 2-3k you save on pure stripe won't pay for the extra developer / accounting time to maintain all that.
  - chasebank 2y ago
    Until they raise their pricing too. Currently we use a processor agnostic billing engine - sticky.io - but they were purchased by private equity and are doing private equity things. Raising prices, charging per transaction fees, etc. Plus, their software and api is downright terrible but it's what we decided on 12 years ago so here we are. Vendor lock-in sucks. Open to payment stack suggestions.
  - ankit77 2y ago
    Check out my company OpenPay (getopenpay.com) I previously bootstrapped a business to 30M ARR and was sick of paying the "subscription tax" We give you all the tools you need to build and run your subscription business without having to integrate a dozen different tools together and tear your hair out (and also break the bank). Feel free to reach out to us via the contact form–we're giving people on HN one year free
- ankit77 2y ago
  I'm the founder of OpenPay (getopenpay.com) and a lot of Stripe customers migrated to us as an alternative. We give you all the functionality that Stripe provides without the "Stripe tax" Feel free to reach out to us and we'll hook you up
dboreham 2y ago
The whole idea that billing should be "a service" was a Jedi Mind Trick.
- hibikir 2y ago
  There are industries where billing is a service for very good reasons: Telcos have been buying entire billing packages, paying a mint for them, for decades. The issue is whether one needs a battleship sized, super flexible, yet expensive billing solution for much smaller problems.
thedangler 2y ago
That is quite the markup. You should look into using a processor and a gateway with a solid API. email me if you have questions.
bastawhiz 2y ago
That implies you're only charging a few dollars per transaction (where the $0.30 fixed cost per transaction with sticker pricing is 2-4% of the transaction). That's about $7. It's great to want to charge only a small amount, but this is easily fixed by billing annually and allowing payments through lower-fee payment methods like ACH. I was in your shoes when I started my business, charging $5/mo. I increased my prices to $10/mo and enabled annual billing (with a $10 discount) and saw MRR grow, both through added sales and increased retention (fewer payments means fewer opportunities for failed payments). And increased revenue on volume, since I pay less in fees.
- chucky123 2y ago
  Nope, b2b saas. We charge a decent amount. Scroll down Stripe's pricing page, they will charge you for literally everything. We have annual pricing and that definitely results in lower fees and other stuff. But only a small percentage of our users are on the annual plan.
  - bastawhiz 2y ago
    I used to work at Stripe and I'm very familiar with the pricing. I'm simply perplexed at how you can possibly be paying them up to 7% if your payments are B2B-sized. BNPL acceptance is the only thing that even comes close to that. You'd need to load up on nearly every single metered feature (billing, Tax, chargeback protection, revenue recognition, radar for teams, etc) to pay that much with sticker pricing.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
ankit77 2y ago
Check out getopenpay.com I ran into the same issues / frustrations as you when I bootstrapped my previous business to 30M ARR. I hated paying the "Stripe tax" and having vendor lock in with Stripe Feel free to reach out to us on the website and we'll take care of you with free subscription management for a year

moralestapia 2y ago

Can you (and GP, and others in the thread) suggest alternatives? I'm about to work on payments for a new product, would like to try something new!

chucky123 2y ago
i don't use a 3rd party billing solution. I straight up created my own. If you have a single type of pricing(eg, variable, or tiered) its very easy rolling your own. The issues happen when you change from variable to tiered(or vice versa), change from anniversary to calendary dates, add coupons, per user custom pricing, credits, etc etc. I don't recommend building your own if you aren't familiar with Stripe or any other billing system. Once you understand how billing works, feel free to make a custom billing solution.
- Rafsark 2y ago
  You are right! The issues usually happen when you add more complexity (tiers, discounts, credit notes, coupons, prepaid credits). Also, what I find very tough is that this is not a « one stop shop »: every single company has it’s own definition of what should be included or excluded from the MRR. I am pretty sure you never end up on an universal definition
- ankit77 2y ago
  I started OpenPay (getopenpay.com) as an alternative to Stripe. We're giving subscription management for free to the HN community for a year We support all the edge cases you mentioned around variable/tiered pricing, coupons, etc all part of our solution
j33zusjuice 2y ago
Have you already looked here? https://alternativeto.net/software/stripe/ https://alternativeto.net/software/stripe/ I don’t run any commerce sites, myself, but is there a big difference in using stripe vs a more traditional processor, like working with CardPointe or something?
internetter 2y ago
I'm seriously considering https://www.paddle.com/ https://www.paddle.com/. For 5% + $0.5, they promise that you'll never need to worry about - Chargebacks - Global tax compliance - Billing support - Fraud - Subscription management Their API is... worse... and it is expensive... but mathing it out it is like 1% for all that peace of mind. Feels worth it.
- ensignavenger 2y ago
  Until you build out your business around their API and processes, and they decide to start charging more... and more.. Obviously you need to use some third party services, but as soon as your business is viable, always be preparing the ability to switch to competitors.
- jokethrowaway 2y ago
  Paddle is pretty bad. Support is bad in general, the API is bad, you never win a chargeback (you still have to worry about chargebacks). I wanted to try lemonsqueezy but now it's been acquired by stripe, so it will likely turn into another expensive Death Star. MoR solutions are a good idea; the tax (F*K VATMOSS Europe) / accounting overhead is likely not worth it. Having a single B2B transaction whenever you want is much easier to deal with. When your income is large enough that the % you'd be saving let you afford developer time to implement and maintain taxes / billing and extra for accounting of thousands of transactions, then go for it and switch to a cheaper solution. Let's say you make 100k per year: the 2-3k you save on pure stripe won't pay for the extra developer / accounting time to maintain all that.
- chasebank 2y ago
  Until they raise their pricing too. Currently we use a processor agnostic billing engine - sticky.io - but they were purchased by private equity and are doing private equity things. Raising prices, charging per transaction fees, etc. Plus, their software and api is downright terrible but it's what we decided on 12 years ago so here we are. Vendor lock-in sucks. Open to payment stack suggestions.
- ankit77 2y ago
  Check out my company OpenPay (getopenpay.com) I previously bootstrapped a business to 30M ARR and was sick of paying the "subscription tax" We give you all the tools you need to build and run your subscription business without having to integrate a dozen different tools together and tear your hair out (and also break the bank). Feel free to reach out to us via the contact form–we're giving people on HN one year free
ankit77 2y ago
I'm the founder of OpenPay (getopenpay.com) and a lot of Stripe customers migrated to us as an alternative. We give you all the functionality that Stripe provides without the "Stripe tax" Feel free to reach out to us and we'll hook you up

dboreham 2y ago

The whole idea that billing should be "a service" was a Jedi Mind Trick.

hibikir 2y ago
There are industries where billing is a service for very good reasons: Telcos have been buying entire billing packages, paying a mint for them, for decades. The issue is whether one needs a battleship sized, super flexible, yet expensive billing solution for much smaller problems.

thedangler 2y ago

That is quite the markup. You should look into using a processor and a gateway with a solid API. email me if you have questions.

bastawhiz 2y ago

That implies you're only charging a few dollars per transaction (where the $0.30 fixed cost per transaction with sticker pricing is 2-4% of the transaction). That's about $7. It's great to want to charge only a small amount, but this is easily fixed by billing annually and allowing payments through lower-fee payment methods like ACH. I was in your shoes when I started my business, charging $5/mo. I increased my prices to $10/mo and enabled annual billing (with a $10 discount) and saw MRR grow, both through added sales and increased retention (fewer payments means fewer opportunities for failed payments). And increased revenue on volume, since I pay less in fees.

chucky123 2y ago
Nope, b2b saas. We charge a decent amount. Scroll down Stripe's pricing page, they will charge you for literally everything. We have annual pricing and that definitely results in lower fees and other stuff. But only a small percentage of our users are on the annual plan.
- bastawhiz 2y ago
  I used to work at Stripe and I'm very familiar with the pricing. I'm simply perplexed at how you can possibly be paying them up to 7% if your payments are B2B-sized. BNPL acceptance is the only thing that even comes close to that. You'd need to load up on nearly every single metered feature (billing, Tax, chargeback protection, revenue recognition, radar for teams, etc) to pay that much with sticker pricing.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]

ankit77 2y ago

Check out getopenpay.com I ran into the same issues / frustrations as you when I bootstrapped my previous business to 30M ARR. I hated paying the "Stripe tax" and having vendor lock in with Stripe Feel free to reach out to us on the website and we'll take care of you with free subscription management for a year