TL;DR: Payment processing is where the real money lives for wedding vendors — a 1% difference in processing rates across $80,000 annual revenue is $800. Maroo is the clear leader for wedding and event professionals: the only platform with a free tier, ACH fees capped at $15–25 (versus uncapped percentage fees elsewhere), free B2B ACH for contractor payments, and built-in 1099-NEC filing. Rock Paper Coin charges 2.5% uncapped. HoneyBook's effective card rate is ~4.4%. Maroo's ACH cap structure wins on large payments consistently.
Wedding professionals handle some of the largest individual transactions in the service business. A wedding photographer’s average contract might be $3,500–$6,000. A full-service planner might collect $8,000–$20,000 per event. A venue might process $15,000–$50,000 per booking.
At those dollar amounts, payment processing fees are not a rounding error — they’re a significant business expense. Consider:
Beyond processing fees, wedding vendors have payment needs that generic processors don’t serve well:
This guide covers 7 payment software options for wedding vendors, with detailed fee comparisons, feature breakdowns, and honest assessments of where each fits.
Note: Stripe standard rates (used by Dubsado, HoneyBook's competitor platforms) are 2.9%+$0.30 for cards, 0.8% ACH capped at $5. Sprout FlowPay is a notable below-market card rate.
On a $5,000 ACH payment, Dubsado via Stripe (0.8% capped at $5) actually caps lower than Maroo — but Dubsado lacks contractor payments, 1099 filing, and a free tier. The complete value equation favors Maroo when all factors are considered.
Best for: All wedding vendors — photographers, planners, florists, DJs, caterers, venues — who need both client-facing invoicing and contractor payment management
Starting price: Free
Website: maroo.us
Maroo is purpose-built for the wedding and event industry and does more than just process payments — it handles the entire financial relationship between a wedding vendor, their clients, and their contractors.
Why Maroo leads on client payment collection:
The ACH fee cap is the headline differentiator for high-value transactions. At 1% capped at $15–$25, depending on plan, Maroo’s ACH fee structure works especially well for large wedding payments:
To be precise, Maroo’s ACH structure is most advantageous for payments between roughly $2,500 and $10,000. For payments above $10,000, both Maroo and Stripe have their respective caps. The overall advantage comes from Maroo’s complete package — the fee cap, contractor payments, and 1099 filing.
Why Maroo leads on contractor payments:
This is where Maroo has no real competitor in the wedding space. Every other platform in this guide is purely about collecting money from clients. Maroo also handles paying out:
For a wedding planner who pays 5 contractors per event and runs 20 events per year, filing 1099s manually at tax time or through a third-party service costs $5–$15 per form plus significant time. Maroo’s integrated approach saves both.
Fee pass-through: Maroo allows vendors to pass processing fees to clients on all plans. If you quote a client $4,000 for your services and enable fee pass-through, you receive exactly $4,000 regardless of how they pay. This is standard surcharging practice and legal in most US states with proper disclosure. HoneyBook does not support fee pass-through.
The free tier: 13,000+ wedding businesses use Maroo, with $350M in invoices created and a 94% on-time payment rate. The free Starter plan is real — not a crippled demo. For vendors processing under $10,000/month, the platform costs nothing.
See full platform comparisons: Maroo vs. HoneyBook
For wedding planners, Maroo pairs perfectly with ThatsTheOne for budget tracking and vendor CRM on the planning side — read more in our best CRM for wedding planners guide.
Best for: Wedding vendors who prioritize polished client presentation and can absorb higher processing costs
Starting price: $36/month ($29/month annual)
Website: honeybook.com
HoneyBook is the most popular CRM + payment platform for wedding professionals, and its polished client-facing experience is genuinely excellent. Smart files, beautiful templates, and a class-leading mobile app justify the premium for vendors where presentation is paramount.
The payment cost problem: HoneyBook processes all payments through its proprietary system and applies a 1.5% surcharge on top of standard card fees. The effective card processing rate is approximately 4.4% (2.9% + $0.25 + 1.5%). ACH is 1.5% with no cap — on a $10,000 payment, that's $150 versus Maroo's $20 cap.
You cannot use Stripe, Square, or PayPal with HoneyBook — the proprietary processor is mandatory. There is no fee pass-through to clients. There are no contractor payment features.
For vendors doing $100,000 in annual payment volume, the difference between HoneyBook's effective 4.4% card rate and Maroo's 3.4–3.5% translates to roughly $1,000 per year in additional processing costs. If ACH adoption is high, the gap widens further.
HoneyBook also raised prices by up to 89% in February 2025. At $29/month annual for Starter (limited), $49/month for Essentials (needed for automations and QuickBooks), or $109/month for Premium, it's meaningfully more expensive than most alternatives.
Best for: Wedding vendors who collect payments in person (at venues, bridal shows, meetings) or need point-of-sale capability
Starting price: Free basic account; hardware varies
Website: squareup.com
Square is not a wedding-industry CRM — it's a general-purpose payment platform that many wedding vendors use for its ubiquity and in-person payment tools. The free reader for tap/chip payments at 2.6% + $0.10 is the lowest card rate for in-person collections in this comparison.
Square Online invoicing runs at 2.9% + $0.30 — competitive with Stripe. ACH payments via Square are 1% capped at $10, which is competitive for mid-range transactions but capped lower than Maroo for very large payments.
What Square doesn't provide: no wedding-industry CRM, no proposal templates, no contract management, no contractor payment system, no 1099 filing, and no native wedding workflow. Most wedding pros using Square use it alongside a separate CRM — which creates data fragmentation and administrative overhead.
For vendors who primarily quote and invoice via a CRM but occasionally need in-person payment collection (at venue walk-throughs, final meetings, or bridal shows), a free Square account paired with Maroo is a workable combination. Maroo handles the formal proposal → contract → invoice → scheduled payments workflow; Square handles spontaneous in-person collections.
Best for: Wedding vendors who want a wedding-industry-specific platform at moderate pricing
Starting price: Free (Basic), $33/month Professional, $41/month Premium
Website: rockpapercoin.com
Rock Paper Coin (RPC) is one of the few platforms in this guide built specifically for the wedding and events industry. It understands the vendor relationship model, supports client autopay, has 1–2 day payouts, and offers a genuinely useful free tier for invoicing-only needs.
The 2.5% fee problem: RPC's 2.5% flat fee on the Professional plan sounds attractive — it's lower than HoneyBook's effective rate and lower than standard Stripe card rates. But it's uncapped and applies to every transaction regardless of size. On a $10,000 venue booking, that's $250 in processing fees; Maroo ACH caps at $20.
More importantly, RPC has no contractor payment system, no 1099 filing, and no B2B payment tools. It's purely client-facing invoicing and proposals.
Where RPC wins: The free Basic plan includes unlimited invoices and payment processing with 1–2 day payouts — genuinely usable for vendors with a simple invoicing workflow. The platform's wedding-industry focus means features like client autopay and wedding-specific proposal templates are well-designed.
The Basic plan's limitation: no proposals or contracts. Professional ($27.08/month annual) adds those features. Lead management and inquiry forms require Premium ($32.92/month annual).
Best for: Wedding vendors already committed to Dubsado for workflow automation
Starting price: $35/month Starter; $55/month Premier ($43.75/mo annual) — platform cost, not payment cost
Website: dubsado.com + stripe.com
Dubsado doesn't process payments itself — it routes through Stripe, Square, or PayPal at standard processor rates. That means card payments run at 2.9% + $0.30 (Stripe), which is competitive, and ACH at 0.8% capped at $5 (Stripe) — which is a very low cap but also a very low ceiling.
Dubsado allows fee pass-through to clients, which means vendors can quote net amounts and pass the processing cost along. For vendors in states where surcharging is legal and who have communicated the practice to clients, this effectively eliminates processing costs.
Dubsado's gap on payments: no contractor payment system, no 1099 filing, and the ACH cap of $5 via Stripe means there's no meaningful ACH advantage on large payments (both Stripe and Maroo cap, but Stripe's $5 cap is hit much earlier on lower payment amounts — e.g. any ACH payment over $625 maxes out at $5, whereas Maroo's cap kicks in above $2,500 on Business).
The platform subscription cost ($43.75–$55/month for Premier) is separate from processing fees and is the real cost consideration for Dubsado.
Best for: Wedding vendors who manage their accounting entirely in QuickBooks and want payment collection integrated
Starting price: QuickBooks subscription + payment processing fees; no separate payment platform fee
Website: quickbooks.intuit.com
QuickBooks Payments is not a standalone payment platform — it's the payment processing layer built into QuickBooks Online. For vendors already managing their books in QuickBooks, enabling native payment collection eliminates the reconciliation step between a separate CRM and accounting software.
Processing rates: 2.99% for card-not-present (keyed or invoiced), 2.5% for swiped cards, 1% ACH capped at $10. Competitive rates, but no wedding-industry CRM features — no proposals, no wedding-specific contract templates, no guest or vendor management.
Most wedding vendors use QuickBooks for accounting and a separate platform (Maroo, HoneyBook, Dubsado) for CRM and client management. Maroo integrates with QuickBooks directly, so you can use Maroo for client-facing workflows and QuickBooks for accounting without manual data transfer.
Best for: Wedding planners who need to track client budgets and vendor payment schedules alongside planning work
Starting price: ~$57/month (£45)
Website: thatstheone.com
ThatsTheOne is not a payment processor — it doesn't send invoices or collect credit card payments. But it deserves inclusion here because it handles the budget and payment tracking layer that planners need alongside their payment platform.
TTO's budget management feature tracks client budgets against actual spend, vendor payment schedules, and outstanding payments across the entire event. For planners managing complex multi-vendor events with staggered payment schedules, this visibility is critical — and it's not available in Maroo, HoneyBook, or Dubsado.
The recommended stack: Maroo handles actual payment collection and contractor payouts; TTO handles budget tracking, vendor payment schedule monitoring, and the planning-side financial picture. Together, they give planners complete financial visibility across their business.
TTO's payment tracking feature helps planners answer questions like: Which vendors have been paid? Which vendor deposits are due next week? Is this client over or under budget? These are planning questions, not accounting questions, and they require a planning tool to answer properly.
This section matters specifically for wedding vendors who pay contractors. If you're a solo photographer or planner who never hires help, skip ahead. If you hire second shooters, assistants, coordinators, or any independent contractor paid more than $600/year, this is worth reading carefully.
The 1099-NEC requirement: Any US business that pays an independent contractor $600 or more in a calendar year must issue a 1099-NEC form. Failure to file carries IRS penalties ($50–$270 per form, depending on lateness). Most wedding pros with contractors are legally required to file these forms and many don't realize it.
What most platforms offer: Nothing. HoneyBook, Dubsado, HoneyBook, Rock Paper Coin, Square, and QuickBooks Payments (standalone) do not include contractor payment tools or 1099 filing. You'd need a separate service (Gusto, a CPA, or manual IRS filing) to handle this.
What Maroo offers: Complete 1099-NEC management built into the platform. Maroo collects and stores W-9s from contractors, tracks all payments made to each contractor, prepares 1099-NEC forms at year-end, e-files to the IRS, and mails physical copies to contractors. Cost: $5/form on Starter, $3/form on Business, included free on Pro.
For a photographer who pays one second shooter and one editor year-round (2 contractors), that's $6–10/year in 1099 filing costs on Maroo versus a third-party filing service that typically charges $20–50 per form.
Scenario: Wedding vendor, $100,000 annual revenue, 60% card payments ($60K), 40% ACH ($40K), average transaction $4,000 (10 card transactions, 10 ACH transactions).
Stripe via Dubsado wins on pure processing cost if you're comfortable with $5 ACH caps. Maroo wins on complete value (free tier, contractor payments, 1099 filing). Rock Paper Coin is cheapest for pure card processing. HoneyBook is the most expensive.
Choose Maroo if: You want the lowest total cost of ownership for a wedding business — accounting for subscription, processing fees, contractor payment tools, and 1099 filing. The free tier is real and functional.
Choose HoneyBook if: Client-facing polish and automations are worth the higher processing costs, and you don't pay contractors regularly.
Choose Square if: You primarily need in-person payment collection and already have a separate CRM.
Choose Rock Paper Coin if: You want a wedding-specific platform with simple invoicing and a usable free tier, and ACH processing isn't a priority.
Choose Dubsado if: You're committed to Dubsado's automation system and want the standard Stripe processing rates that come with it.
Choose ThatsTheOne alongside Maroo if: You're a wedding planner who needs budget tracking and payment schedule visibility on the planning side as well as payment collection on the business side.
Q: What is the cheapest way to accept wedding payments?
The cheapest structure depends on your payment volume and mix. For ACH payments on large transactions of $2,500+, Maroo’s capped ACH fee at 1%, with a $15–$25 max depending on plan, is competitive. For card payments, Sprout Studio’s FlowPay at 2.75% + $0.30 and Rock Paper Coin’s 2.5% flat rate are lower than standard Stripe at 2.9% + $0.30. Dubsado routing through Stripe and Bloom on Standard/Plus also use standard Stripe rates. HoneyBook is the most expensive due to the proprietary 1.5% surcharge.
Q: Can I charge clients for credit card processing fees?
Yes — this is legal in most US states when disclosed properly, and it’s called surcharging or fee pass-through. Maroo supports fee pass-through on all plans. Dubsado via Stripe also supports it. HoneyBook does not. If your goal is to receive your full quoted price regardless of payment method, choose a platform that supports fee pass-through.
Q: How does contractor payment work in Maroo?
Maroo’s contractor payment tool, called Payouts/Bill Pay, lets you send ACH transfers to contractors for free. You store the contractor’s bank information and W-9 within Maroo. Payments are processed in batches or individually. At year-end, Maroo uses the payment records to prepare 1099-NEC forms, e-file them with the IRS, and mail paper copies to contractors. The 1099 filing cost is $5/form on Starter, $3/form on Business, and free on Pro.
Q: Is Maroo’s free tier actually functional?
Yes. Maroo’s Starter plan is free for vendors processing under $10,000/month. It includes full lead capture, quotes, contracts, invoicing, payment processing, basic contractor payouts, and 1099 filing at $5/form. The main limitations are the $10K/month processing cap, 5 contracts/month with $5 each after, and 3 free contractor payouts. For most entry-level wedding vendors, the free tier fully covers their needs.
Q: How does Maroo compare to simply using Stripe directly?
Stripe alone gives you payment processing but no CRM features — no lead capture, no proposal templates, no contract management, no invoice scheduling, and no 1099 filing. You’d need to build those capabilities separately or pay for another platform. Maroo wraps all of those features around Stripe-competitive processing rates of 3.25–3.5% for cards in a wedding-industry-specific workflow. For most wedding vendors, the complete package is worth more than pure payment processing.
