Stripe and Authorize.Net are both ways to take card payments online, and at the entry tier, both charge 2.9% plus 30 cents per sale. The difference is how they are built. Stripe is an all-in-one processor with a flat rate and no monthly fee. Authorize.Net is a gateway that usually connects to a merchant account you bring yourself, with a monthly fee, and that structure is where its pricing flexibility comes from.
For a camp, the right choice comes down to your volume, whether you want to manage your own merchant account, and how the seasonal calendar affects your costs. Here is the verified pricing and a straight answer for camps.
What is the difference between Stripe and Authorize.Net?
Stripe is a processor and gateway in one. You sign up and start taking cards without a separate merchant account, on a fixed per-transaction rate. Authorize.Net is primarily a payment gateway. Its All-in-One plan bundles a merchant account so you can start right away, but its lower-cost Gateway Only plan connects to a merchant account you already have or open separately.
That separation is the point: Stripe bundles everything at one flat rate, while Authorize.Net asks you to shop for a processing rate and plug it in, which adds flexibility and also adds work.
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Stripe vs. Authorize.Net: How Do The Fees Compare?
Stripe, standard plan: no monthly fee, no setup fee, and no contract. The card rate is 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction, and ACH runs 0.8%, capped at $5.
Authorize.Net All-in-One: $25 per month, no setup fee, and no contract. The card rate is 2.9% plus 30 cents per transaction, with eCheck available on the separate eCheck plan.
Authorize.Net Gateway Only: $25 per month, no setup fee, and no contract. You connect your own merchant account, so you pay 10 cents per transaction plus a 10-cent daily batch fee on top of whatever rate that merchant account charges. eCheck is 0.75% on the Gateway plus eCheck plan.
At the entry level, both charge 2.9% plus 30 cents per card sale, so the headline rate is a wash. Two things separate them. Authorize.Net adds a $25 monthly gateway fee that you pay every month whether or not you process anything, which matters for a camp that is busy for a season and quiet the rest of the year. And its lower rates are not automatic.
They require pairing the Gateway Only plan with your own merchant account on interchange-plus pricing, which Authorize.Net says can reach roughly 2.2% to 2.5% at volume. That can pay off for a large, year-round operation with someone to manage it. For a seasonal camp processing in bursts, Stripe's flat rate with no monthly fee is usually the cleaner baseline.
Does Authorize.Net Require A Merchant Account?
It depends on the plan. The All-in-One plan includes a merchant account, so you can start without one. The Gateway Only plan does not: it connects to a merchant account you bring, which is what unlocks the lower interchange-plus rates. Stripe never requires a separate merchant account, since it acts as the processor itself.
That is why Stripe is faster to set up and simpler to run, with the trade-off that its price is fixed. For a camp, this is the real fork: fewer moving parts with Stripe, or lower rates at volume with Authorize.Net in exchange for managing a merchant account and a monthly fee.
Is Stripe or Authorize.Net Better For Camps?
Camps have traits that tilt this decision. Registration is seasonal and spiky, tuition often runs a few hundred to a few thousand dollars, and most camps bill in deposits and installments rather than one charge. Because the season is short, a year-round $25 monthly fee is real overhead for only a few active months, which is one reason many camps prefer Stripe's pay-only-when-you-process model. Both platforms support recurring and installment billing for deposit-then-balance schedules.
For a large tuition payment, offering ACH or eCheck saves real money either way, since 0.8% capped at 5 on Stripe or 0.75% on Authorize.Net's eCheck plan beats the card rate on a $1,000 charge. One point in Authorize.Net's favor: because it can run on a dedicated merchant account, it’s less exposed to the occasional fund hold an aggregator like Stripe can place during an unusual spike. Though you can lower that risk by telling Stripe your expected registration-season volume ahead of time.
And if your camp is a 501(c)(3), it is worth asking Authorize.Net about the nonprofit pricing it offers on higher-volume accounts.
Which Payment Gateway Is Easier to Set Up?
Stripe is the fastest to start. You can create an account and take a payment the same day, with funds usually arriving in about two business days. Authorize.Net's All-in-One can auto-approve in as little as an hour, but the Gateway Only route means opening a merchant account, which can take one to five business days, with industry-average funding of three to five business days after that. If a registration deadline is close, speed clearly favors Stripe.
Which Payment Gateway Should Your Camp Choose?
For most camps, Stripe is the more natural fit. It starts fast, charges no monthly fee, and matches the on-and-off rhythm of a seasonal program without locking you into year-round costs. Authorize.Net makes more sense in specific cases: you already run your own merchant account, you process high enough volume year-round to benefit from interchange-plus, or you want a dedicated account that rarely sees holds.
There is a third path worth naming. Your registration software may handle processing for you, which folds the gateway question into the same system that collects sign-ups and runs payment plans.
Regpack has built-in payment processing and supports Stripe, with volume-based rates starting as low as 1.5% depending on your card mix and plan, and it keeps card data tokenized and off your own systems as a PCI-DSS Level 2 certified, SOC 2 Type II audited platform. For a camp, that turns three separate decisions- the gateway, the payment plans, and the registration flow- into one, and keeps you on the flat, fast-to-start model most camps want anyway