You booked a wedding for $8,500. The couple pays the deposit online by credit card. You get a notification -- and then you do the math.
Square just kept $247 of that deposit.
For a single transaction, that stings. For a photographer, planner, or florist running a $250,000 book of business, that math becomes $7,250 to $8,250 in processing fees every single year -- fees that quietly disappear from your revenue with no opt-out.
That's exactly why so many wedding and event professionals are searching "Maroo vs Square" in 2026. Not because Square is a bad product -- it's genuinely excellent for what it was built to do. But the wedding industry runs on large milestone payments, months-long client relationships, contractor payouts, and very specific cash flow patterns that a general-purpose POS platform was never designed to handle.
This post breaks down both platforms honestly. You'll get a clear comparison of pricing, fees, features, and real-world cost scenarios -- so you can decide which tool (or combination of tools) actually makes sense for your business.
Maroo was built from the ground up for wedding and event professionals. Every feature -- from payment schedules to contractor payouts to 1099 filing -- exists because someone in the wedding industry asked for it. It's a vertical SaaS product with a narrow, deep focus.
Square is one of the most successful fintech companies in the world, serving millions of businesses across retail, restaurants, salons, fitness studios, and yes, some event vendors. Its breadth is its greatest strength and, for wedding businesses, occasionally its greatest limitation.
At the subscription level, Maroo Business ($50/mo) and Square Plus ($49/mo) are nearly identical in price -- making the real comparison about what you get for that money, and critically, what happens to your processing fees.
This is where the comparison gets serious. And honestly, it's where most wedding professionals make their decision.
Maroo allows you to pass processing fees directly to your clients -- meaning your business absorbs $0 in card fees.
When a client pays a $4,000 deposit by credit card on Maroo Business, the 3.4% fee ($136) is added to the client's total -- your $4,000 lands in your account intact. If your clients prefer ACH bank transfer, the fee drops to 1.25%, which many clients will accept for a large payment. And if you're paying a vendor or second shooter via B2B ACH, that transfer is free on every plan.
Square does not offer fee-passing for invoices or online payments. The fees are yours, full stop.
For a $4,000 invoice paid online via Square Plus, you pay $116.30 in fees -- and there's no way to recover that from your client within the Square system.
Wedding payments are large. A typical wedding planner invoice isn't $50 -- it's $3,500 for a deposit, $4,000 for a progress payment, and $2,500 at final balance. In these transaction sizes, even a "low" processing rate of 2.9% compounds aggressively. A $5,000 payment is $145.30 on Square Plus. That same $5,000 payment on Maroo Business costs your business nothing.
To be direct: Square is a genuinely excellent platform with real advantages for certain parts of the event business.
1. In-person and day-of payments. Square's hardware ecosystem is unmatched. The Square Reader, Square Stand, and Terminal let you take tap-to-pay, chip, and swipe payments anywhere -- a cocktail hour vendor, a pop-up florals booth, a day-of coordination business. Maroo has no hardware or in-person payment capability.
2. Online appointment booking. Square Appointments offers 24/7 self-booking with automated reminders -- a powerful tool for photographers doing consultations or makeup artists booking pre-wedding trials. Maroo does not currently offer a client-facing appointment booking system.
3. Buy now, pay later via Afterpay. Square's integration with Afterpay lets clients split purchases into installments -- potentially reducing sticker shock on higher-ticket services.
4. Marketing and client communication tools. Square includes built-in email and SMS marketing, a loyalty program, and Square Messages for two-way communication.
5. Brand recognition and ecosystem breadth. Square is a household name. Clients recognize the Square payment screen and trust it.
6. ACH cap on paid plans. For very large single transactions, Square's ACH fee cap of $10 on Plus and Premium plans is genuinely competitive. A $25,000 venue deposit processed via Square ACH on a Plus plan costs just $10.
1. Zero effective processing costs via fee-passing. This is the headline advantage, and it compounds dramatically at scale. When your business collects $300,000/year in client invoices and pays $0 in processing fees because those fees are transparently passed to your clients, your bottom line is materially different. Square offers no equivalent mechanism.
2. Purpose-built payment schedules for event deposits. Wedding and event businesses typically collect a booking deposit at signing, a progress payment midway through, and a final balance before the event. Maroo's invoicing system is designed around exactly this workflow.
3. Contractor payments with W-9 collection and 1099 filing. If you pay second shooters, assistant planners, day-of coordinators, or florists as independent contractors, Maroo handles the entire workflow: contractors receive a payment request, submit their W-9 through the platform, get paid via ACH, and at tax time you can generate 1099s automatically. Square has nothing comparable.
4. B2B ACH transfers are free on all plans. Paying other businesses? On all Maroo plans, B2B ACH transfers carry zero fees.
5. Built for the wedding industry -- top to bottom. The CRM fields, the payment schedule logic, the contract templates, the tax filing workflows -- everything in Maroo was designed around how wedding businesses actually operate.
Some wedding and event professionals find that the optimal setup uses both tools, with each doing what it does best.
Maroo handles:
Square handles:
This isn't overkill -- it's specialization. The subscription cost of both (Maroo Business at $50/mo + Square Plus at $49/mo) totals $99/month -- often more than offset by the fee savings on even a moderate invoicing volume.
Assumption: All client invoices paid via credit card online. Square: 2.9% + $0.30 per transaction (Plus plan). Maroo: 0% to your business (fee passed to client).
For a wedding planner processing $500,000 in client billing, the difference between Square and Maroo isn't a rounding error -- it's $14,530 per year staying in your business. Over five years, that's more than $72,000.
Even at $100,000 in annual invoicing -- a realistic number for a part-time planner or boutique photographer -- the savings are nearly $3,000/year, far exceeding Maroo's $50/month Business plan cost ($600/year).
Square is a world-class platform -- for the businesses it was built for. If you're running a nail salon, a restaurant, or a boutique retail shop, Square is probably your best option.
But if you're a wedding planner, photographer, florist, DJ, caterer, or event coordinator whose revenue comes primarily from large client invoices -- Square's fee model will quietly cost you thousands of dollars every year, with no way to opt out.
Maroo was built to solve exactly that problem. Fee-passing isn't a workaround or a trick -- it's a transparent, client-friendly model where the cost of card processing appears as a line item on the invoice, just like it does in countless other professional service industries. Clients who prefer to avoid the fee can pay by ACH bank transfer. The math works in your favor at virtually every volume level above $5,000/month.
If you're a wedding professional looking to stop subsidizing payment networks out of your own revenue, Maroo deserves a serious look. If you need day-of hardware and a marketing suite on top of invoicing, consider a hybrid setup -- Maroo for your client billing and Square for your in-person moments.
Ready to see how much you could save on payment processing? Start free on Maroo -- the Starter plan is free for businesses invoicing under $5K/month, with no credit card required to get started.
Does Square allow you to pass processing fees to clients?
No. Square's processing fees are absorbed by the business -- there is no native fee-passing feature for invoices or online payments. Maroo, by contrast, is built with transparent fee-passing as a core feature.
Is Maroo really free?
Maroo's Starter plan is free for businesses invoicing under $5,000/month. It includes the CRM, contracts, invoicing, and payments. The $50/month Business plan is designed for full-time professionals who need lower pass-through rates, priority support, and higher invoice volumes.
Can I use both Maroo and Square?
Yes, and many wedding professionals do. A common setup is to use Maroo for all client invoicing, contracts, CRM, and contractor payments -- and Square for any in-person card transactions at events or venues. The combined cost of both mid-tier plans ($50 + $49 = $99/month) is typically offset quickly by the processing fee savings on your invoice volume.
Does Maroo work for non-wedding event businesses?
Yes. While Maroo was designed with the wedding industry in mind, its features -- milestone invoicing, contractor payments, 1099 filing, ACH processing -- are equally well-suited to corporate event planners, venue operators, photographers, videographers, and any service business that operates on project-based, deposit-driven billing.
Last updated: March 2026. Pricing and feature information reflects publicly available data as of the publication date. For the most current pricing, visit maroo.us and squareup.com.
