Cash to open versus all-in: what a UK POS actually costs in August 2026
Verified 23 August 2026. Hardware you pay before the first cover, then the monthly total at £40,000 of card sales and a £25 ticket. We are not the cheapest on every line.
Two numbers decide a POS buy, and most comparison pages only print one of them. Cash to open is the till and kitchen kit you pay before the first cover. All-in is software plus those extras plus hardware spread over twelve months plus card fees at your volume. We publish both, from the same model, and we update the date when the inputs change.
Twelve months of hardware amortisation is the window that most flatters Servio, because our hardware line is £0. A shorter window would make the rivals look cheaper still on the monthly all-in. That sentence belongs at the top, not in a footnote.
Cash to open, first-party kits only
We count the provider’s own till plus kitchen kit. We do not add iPads to Square, Zettle or SumUp. On 23 August 2026 those published kits are Square £1,687, Zettle £895, SumUp £549, Servio £0. Servio runs on a tablet you already have. If you do not own one, buy any tablet you like; it is not a Servio SKU and we do not pretend it is free hardware from us.
All-in at the default Growth venue
Same venue we use everywhere: £40,000 a month in card sales, £25 average order, 70% in person and 30% QR, hardware spread over 12 months, all ex VAT. On that profile the monthly totals are Servio Growth £999 (about £11,988 a year), SumUp about £1,002, Zettle about £1,015, Square about £1,092 (about £13,104 a year). The founding Growth pilot lands around £889 all-in while the £109 months last.
Servio is lowest on that monthly total, by a few pounds over SumUp, and £0 to open, with QR, kitchen display, inventory, loyalty and staff in one plan. Below about £24 average order SumUp takes the monthly line. That is the honest ranking. Square and SumUp charge extra for loyalty; Square’s inventory add-on is MarketMan at £79, Growth-only in our like-for-like stack. We do not double-count SumUp loyalty.
Why a small ticket can flip the card line
Servio’s in-person rate is Stripe’s 1.4% + 10p. The ten pence per tap is expensive on a café ticket. Below about £24 average order, some published in-person rates beat that blend. Put your own ticket into the calculator on ' + a('/pricing', 'Pricing') + '. The verdict names the cheapest rival at your numbers, not always Square.
The arithmetic, the 70/30 split and the sources sit on the ' + a('/pos-cost-methodology', 'methodology page') + '. The longer buying-guide versions are the ' + a('/blog/how-much-does-restaurant-pos-cost-uk', 'UK POS cost guide') + ' and the ' + a('/blog/best-pos-systems-restaurants-uk', '2026 system comparison') + '. If a figure on those pages drifts from the model, CI fails the build.
Common questions
Who is cheapest to open?
Servio is £0 to open because it runs on tablets you already own. Published first-party till and kitchen kits: SumUp £549, Zettle £895, Square £1,687. Those figures do not add iPads to the rivals.
Who is cheapest all-in at £40,000 a month and a £25 ticket?
On 23 August 2026 that ranking is Servio Growth £999, SumUp about £1,002, Zettle about £1,015, Square about £1,092. Servio is lowest, though only just against SumUp, and wins cash-to-open outright.
Why does a £25 ticket matter?
Stripe’s 10p per in-person transaction is expensive on a small café ticket. Below about £24 average order a flat-percentage rival beats Servio’s blend on the month. The live calculator on Pricing is there so you can put your own ticket in.