P.S.A: GoCardless Changes (May Effect Fees)

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

Hey all,

First of all, don’t panic. They aren’t putting their prices up. But YOUR price may go up if you don’t act.

In their own words:
‘We currently offer three core pricing plans: Standard, Plus and Pro. Based on extensive research on customer needs and feature use, we’re replacing these with three brand new pricing plans called Standard, Advanced and Pro.’

There is more to this, but each level will be charged a slightly different rate. Between 1 to 1.4% + 20p. Ex VAT.

Now, 1% + 20p is what we are charged currently. HOWEVER GoCardless may determine you would ‘benefit’ from the Advanced or Pro plan. And in October will assign you to it, along with the higher charge.

It’s up to yourself if these higher plans are worth it for you. But if not, you can contact them and ask them to put you on standard (or can ask to go up, if you want).

You’ll get a email about this. And the email will contain the link with more info and to ask to switch plans. But I’m putting this here so you don’t miss the email. Perhaps we can even have this pinned at the top of the forum for a few months.

Finally, a link to the PDF explaining the different tiers.

https://image.comms.gocardless.com/lib/fe38117371640478751072/m/1/ea8568c0-edf4-4007-8c55-e6ceb3742481.pdf

 

[Iron Giant]

I heard about this the other week but not yet received an email which I doubt I'll miss, good of you to put this up.

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

I heard about this the other week but not yet received an email which I doubt I'll miss, good of you to put this up.

Yes, no doubt they are sending them in waves. I’ve gotten the email as my mum’s company has received it, but I haven’t actually yet received it to my window cleaning company.

 

[scottish cleaning service]

I don't think anyone on Gocardless will pay less than they are paying at the moment. I'll stick with Bacs at the moment and gradually move over to standing order.

 

[Iron Giant]

Yes, no doubt they are sending them in waves. I’ve gotten the email as my mum’s company has received it, but I haven’t actually yet received it to my window cleaning company.

I'll probably get mine on the 30th of September

 

[Chris34]

Yeah thanks for highlighting it, I got mine about 4 weeks ago (probably looking after their biggest customers first ?). It's not going up but like you say they are moving everyone onto the higher tariff, so if you don't switch back then it's going to cost an extra 40p per £100 collected. Doesn't sound like a lot but that's £40 for every £10k.

I'm guessing they've done this as a way of increasing the rates but not annoying customers. In effect I think they're relying on a certain amount of customers to not take much notice and therefor won't make the switch to the cheapest tariff. 0.4% doesn't sound like a lot, but to GoCardless that's a 40% increase in their price (1% to 1.4%), so say they were making £1billion profit, well potentially that could be anything up to £1.4billion profit with this change.

 

[Pjj]

Yeah thanks for highlighting it, I got mine about 4 weeks ago (probably looking after their biggest customers first ?). It's not going up but like you say they are moving everyone onto the higher tariff, so if you don't switch back then it's going to cost an extra 40p per £100 collected. Doesn't sound like a lot but that's £40 for every £10k.

I'm guessing they've done this as a way of increasing the rates but not annoying customers. In effect I think they're relying on a certain amount of customers to not take much notice and therefor won't make the switch to the cheapest tariff. 0.4% doesn't sound like a lot, but to GoCardless that's a 40% increase in their price (1% to 1.4%), so say they were making £1billion profit, well potentially that could be anything up to £1.4billion profit with this change.

It’s like a stealth tax ??

 

[scottish cleaning service]

Cleaner planner will follow suit, I guess.

 

[Chris34]

It’s like a stealth tax ??

I might have to try their tactics...

Dear customer, I'm changing my services that I offer.... the service you're on is not changing and the price is exactly the same... you will be switched onto the advanced clean service as I feel this will suit your requirements

Standard service - window frames and doors
Advanced service - windows frames and doors, door handles wiped / polished +£5
Premium service - as above but you get garage door cleaned, sills regularly cleaned with pvc cleaner +£10

?

 

[P4dstar]

Hey all,

First of all, don’t panic. They aren’t putting their prices up. But YOUR price may go up if you don’t act.

In their own words:
‘We currently offer three core pricing plans: Standard, Plus and Pro. Based on extensive research on customer needs and feature use, we’re replacing these with three brand new pricing plans called Standard, Advanced and Pro.’

There is more to this, but each level will be charged a slightly different rate. Between 1 to 1.4% + 20p. Ex VAT.

Now, 1% + 20p is what we are charged currently. HOWEVER GoCardless may determine you would ‘benefit’ from the Advanced or Pro plan. And in October will assign you to it, along with the higher charge.

It’s up to yourself if these higher plans are worth it for you. But if not, you can contact them and ask them to put you on standard (or can ask to go up, if you want).

You’ll get a email about this. And the email will contain the link with more info and to ask to switch plans. But I’m putting this here so you don’t miss the email. Perhaps we can even have this pinned at the top of the forum for a few months.

Finally, a link to the PDF explaining the different tiers.

https://image.comms.gocardless.com/lib/fe38117371640478751072/m/1/ea8568c0-edf4-4007-8c55-e6ceb3742481.pdf

I got mine. They recommend I stay on the standard plan. If they recommend that for me they’ll recommend that for most of the people on here. Worth checking in case they make an admin error in recommending the new package

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

I got mine. They recommend I stay on the standard plan. If they recommend that for me they’ll recommend that for most of the people on here. Worth checking in case they make an admin error in recommending the new package

Just to circle back to this:
A friend (another window cleaner) who has about 50 customers max on GoCardless was told he was going on the ‘Pro’ plan. So it seems to be really random how they are allocating it. So still worth everyone checks when they get their email.

 

[P4dstar]

Just to circle back to this:
A friend (another window cleaner) who has about 50 customers max on GoCardless was told he was going on the ‘Pro’ plan. So it seems to be really random how they are allocating it. So still worth everyone checks when they get their email.

Perhaps that is a wrong recommendation. Or perhaps it’s done that way to promote growth with those additional tools. The other thing is security also, if ever you’ve had charge backs etc the pro is the only way to deal with them. One of the most obvious things is the questionnaires they send out. They have been asking security questions in those for ages. I once did one on survey monkey, I ticked not important to all the security stuff. I wonder if that affected the recommendation also ?

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

Perhaps that is a wrong recommendation. Or perhaps it’s done that way to promote growth with those additional tools. The other thing is security also, if ever you’ve had charge backs etc the pro is the only way to deal with them. One of the most obvious things is the questionnaires they send out. They have been asking security questions in those for ages. I once did one on survey monkey, I ticked not important to all the security stuff. I wonder if that affected the recommendation also ?

Possibly. He’s never had a chargeback or a rejected payment, though. I didn’t ask about questionnaires because I didn’t know they were doing them. I’m sure most folk will be put on standard, but still think it prudent to check and not just assume. It’s a small up-charge but it adds up.

 

[Iron Giant]

Or perhaps it’s done that way to promote growth with those additional tools.

No idea why they've added all those extras like being able to check on someone's credit history I think it is amongst other things I just don't want to be looking into with customers which all seems quite intrusive also no point for £10-20 job the vast majority of people are decent.

The chargeback thing you'd think banks would double-check when a customer allegedly reports an issue and wants their money back when they have signed up to a direct debit paid it for months then allege they knew nothing about it, only happened to me once and I have been using GC for over 7 years

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

No idea why they've added all those extras like being able to check on someone's credit history I think it is amongst other things I just don't want to be looking into with customers which all seems quite intrusive also no point for £10-20 job the vast majority of people are decent.

The chargeback thing you'd think banks would double-check when a customer allegedly reports an issue and wants their money back when they have signed up to a direct debit paid it for months then allege they knew nothing about it, only happened to me once and I have been using GC for over 7 years

I can’t see any ability to check someone’s credit history. Am I missing something? They’re fraud protection where it verifies the person is who they say they are, but that’s all I can see. Remember GoCardless isn’t just used by window cleaners. You can collect single transactions worth £1000s through it. So these tools will be useful to some for sure!

You would hope so with chargebacks. I get it as a protection incase someone gets double charged, or over charged by a large amount. Say accidentally charging a £10 job £100. But the first point of call should be the company to find out what’s going on. Thankfully haven’t had a chargeback yet but I’ve had a few ‘rejected’ aka, they don’t have the money. May need to change my T&Cs and add a fee for rejected payments, since we’ll be getting charged for them now. ?

 

[Iron Giant]

I can’t see any ability to check someone’s credit history. Am I missing something? They’re fraud protection where it verifies the person is who they say they are, but that’s all I can see. Remember GoCardless isn’t just used by window cleaners. You can collect single transactions worth £1000s through it. So these tools will be useful to some for sure!

You would hope so with chargebacks. I get it as a protection incase someone gets double charged, or over charged by a large amount. Say accidentally charging a £10 job £100. But the first point of call should be the company to find out what’s going on. Thankfully haven’t had a chargeback yet but I’ve had a few ‘rejected’ aka, they don’t have the money. May need to change my T&Cs and add a fee for rejected payments, since we’ll be getting charged for them now. ?

This was something that popped up a 1-2 months ago I may have misunderstood what it was as back then and didn't look at these additional things on offer too much as they didn't interest me this was when they most likely started revealing these plans.

I got my email today they recommended I go on the advance plan, I changed that ASAP.

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

This was something that popped up a 1-2 months ago I may have misunderstood what it was as back then and didn't look at these additional things on offer too much as they didn't interest me this was when they most likely started revealing these plans.

I got my email today they recommended I go on the advance plan, I changed that ASAP.

Lol, glad you caught it ?

 

[Cleanco]

Go cardless is a business and is there to make money not help us to collect ours. Seems like they are moving towards catering for the bigger businesses where the real cash is and soon the smaller businesses will be out priced to use their service. It’s been a great service but I think it’s getting too expensive compared to other collection methods available.

 

[Master Jedi Alejandro]

Go cardless is a business and is there to make money not help us to collect ours. Seems like they are moving towards catering for the bigger businesses where the real cash is and soon the smaller businesses will be out priced to use their service. It’s been a great service but I think it’s getting too expensive compared to other collection methods available.

Must say I disagree. Their entire business is to help others collect money, that’s the point. That’s like saying window cleaners ‘do it to make money, not to clean windows’. They’re not mutually exclusive, one requires the other.

I highly doubt GoCardless will move to only offering services to large companies. Direct Debts have been a thing for a very long time and until recently only offered by large companies. It’s probably a saturated market. Hence companies are offering it to smaller and smaller businesses to expand their reach.

Finally, ‘Getting too expensive’ the price hasn’t went up for years. Yes if you go for a higher tier plan it’s more but this entire thread was to help folk not do that. I collected over £1,000 last month with GoCardless. Just got the invoice from them today. £23.14. How in anyway is that ‘too expensive’?

 

[Cleanco]

Must say I disagree. Their entire business is to help others collect money, that’s the point. That’s like saying window cleaners ‘do it to make money, not to clean windows’. They’re not mutually exclusive, one requires the other.

I highly doubt GoCardless will move to only offering services to large companies. Direct Debts have been a thing for a very long time and until recently only offered by large companies. It’s probably a saturated market. Hence companies are offering it to smaller and smaller businesses to expand their reach.

Finally, ‘Getting too expensive’ the price hasn’t went up for years. Yes if you go for a higher tier plan it’s more but this entire thread was to help folk not do that. I collected over £1,000 last month with GoCardless. Just got the invoice from them today. £23.14. How in anyway is that ‘too expensive’?

You’re flogging a dead horse pal. I’ve worked it out and for me I could take me and the misses on a luxury break every year for what it would cost for go cardless to collect my charges of which I get for free via bacs. I know which I would rather do?

 

[Chris34]

Must say I disagree. Their entire business is to help others collect money, that’s the point. That’s like saying window cleaners ‘do it to make money, not to clean windows’. They’re not mutually exclusive, one requires the other.

I highly doubt GoCardless will move to only offering services to large companies. Direct Debts have been a thing for a very long time and until recently only offered by large companies. It’s probably a saturated market. Hence companies are offering it to smaller and smaller businesses to expand their reach.

Finally, ‘Getting too expensive’ the price hasn’t went up for years. Yes if you go for a higher tier plan it’s more but this entire thread was to help folk not do that. I collected over £1,000 last month with GoCardless. Just got the invoice from them today. £23.14. How in anyway is that ‘too expensive’?

It's not actually cost you that either, once you put it through the business the cost to you yourself is less than £20.