What loyalty costs
Prefer to give a slice of every transaction, or one free coffee?
Those are the two ways to run a loyalty programme. One is built into your card machine. One runs on its own. They cost very different amounts, and here is how to work out which is cheaper for you.
The cost nobody shows you
Price up a card machine and you are shown what it costs to take payment. You are not shown what the rewards cost. That comes out of your pocket on top.
Loyalty built into your card machine
- You give back a slice of every sale a regular makes. You pay for that slice.
- The more they spend, the more it costs you.
- You cannot buy it on its own. It comes with a paid card machine plan.
- Cash sales earn nothing, so cash regulars get no reward.
A stamp card that runs on its own
- You give a stamp. Ten stamps, they get the reward. You pay for the reward.
- One stamp a visit, whether they spend R40 or R300.
- Nothing changes at the till. Cash earns a stamp too.
- Half-finished cards cost you nothing at all.
Same customer. Same R240 basket. Two different bills.
R7.20
You pay it there and then. Bigger basket, bigger cost.
R1.20
And only if they come back and fill the card. If they never do, you pay nothing.
Based on a reward that costs you R12 to make, over 10 stamps. A percentage charges you for how much people spend. A stamp charges you for how often they come back.
Side by side
Yoco is the card machine most South African owners know, so we have used them as the example. Every Yoco number here comes from Yoco, with the date we read it.
| Card-machine loyalty (e.g. Yoco Loyalty) † | Lekka | |
|---|---|---|
| How the reward is funded | A percentage of every qualifying sale, set by you (Yoco publishes a typical range of 2 to 5 percent) | The cost of the reward item, once, when a customer earns it |
| Monthly platform fee | R249/mo Plus plan, as published, excluding VAT | Free for your first 50 customers, then from R249/mo |
| Is loyalty sold on its own? | No, only on a paid plan that bundles payments and POS | Yes, priced on its own, independent of how you take payment |
| What does the loyalty cost track? | How much your loyal customers spend. A bigger basket costs you more, every time | How often they come back. One visit is one stamp, whatever the basket size |
| Do you pay for rewards nobody claims? | The reward is funded on the sale, as it happens | No. A card that never gets finished costs you nothing |
| Does the loyalty cost show up in a cost calculator? | No, the funded reward sits on top of the payments bill, out of margin | Yes, it is the cost of the reward, and nothing else |
| Do cash sales earn loyalty? | No, only card payments earn | Yes, a stamp can be given on any sale, cash or card |
| VAT on the price you see | Rates and plan fee are quoted excluding VAT, so add 15 percent for the real bill | No VAT is added. Lekka is not VAT registered, so the price shown is the price paid |
| Tied to a specific card machine? | Yes, it runs on their hardware | No, it works with any till and any payment method |
| How a customer signs up | Their phone number, taken at the terminal | They scan a QR code. No app to download, the card lives in their browser |
† Figures shown for Yoco are as published by Yoco (yoco.com), observed 13 August 2026. Yoco Loyalty is available on the Plus plan (R249/mo). Yoco sets the loyalty earn rate as a percentage the merchant chooses, typically 2 to 5 percent. Card transaction fees are separate: Yoco publishes in-person rates that decline across turnover bands (up to R50k, R50k to R200k, then custom above R200k) and differ by card type (debit, credit, international). Yoco publishes its rates and plan fees excluding VAT; where we show a VAT-inclusive figure it is our own gross-up at 15 percent, shown because that is what you are billed, with the ex-VAT headline alongside. Rates change, so check yoco.com and your own statement for your current figures. Lekka is not a Yoco partner and is not affiliated with Yoco.
Put in your own numbers
We have not printed a monthly total for Yoco anywhere. Their prices change, so a figure we wrote today would be wrong by Christmas and unfair to them. Everything below comes from what you type in, and you can open their published rates and check our working.
What loyalty actually costs, on top of payments
A card-machine loyalty plan bills you twice: the payments you already pay, and a reward funded as a share of every loyal sale. Only the second is really the cost of loyalty. Here is both, against a standalone stamp programme.
Your business
Total turnover per month
Most sales are card now. Cash earns nothing on a card-linked programme, but a stamp can be given on any sale.
Card-machine loyalty
A percentage of loyal spend, set by you. Yoco publishes a typical range of 2 to 5 percent.
The share of card revenue that earns rewards
Stamp programme
This is the whole platform, not a loyalty charge, and there is no VAT to add: Lekka is not VAT registered, so the price shown is the price paid. Most independent businesses start free and stay free for a while.
One stamp per visit, whether they buy one coffee or four. Use your typical stamped sale, not your biggest.
Plenty of customers collect a few stamps and never come back for the rest, and an unfinished card costs you nothing. On our longest-running programme about 6 cards in 10 get finished (August 2026). Younger programmes run lower, because their cards are still filling.
What it costs you to make, not what you sell it for. A free coffee costs about R12 to make. If you give money off the bill instead, put the full amount you take off.
That is the bill a payments calculator shows you, and it stays with your processor whichever loyalty route you choose. It is not the thing to compare. The comparison below is loyalty against loyalty.
The cost of loyalty itself
The percentages under each bar are the same cost against the same loyal spend, so the two are directly comparable. They move for different reasons, and that is the real difference. A percentage reward tracks how much people spend, so your biggest spenders are your most expensive customers. A stamp tracks how often they come back, so a customer who spends R300 in one visit earns one stamp, the same as a customer who spends R40. Change any input to match your own numbers.
Payments figures are an estimate only, marked *estimated, calculated from the published rate card on the Plus plan, using a blended card mix of 65% debit, 30% credit and 5% international rather than the cheaper debit-only headline rate. Figures shown for Yoco are as published by Yoco (yoco.com), observed 13 August 2026Yoco Loyalty is available on the Plus plan (R249earn rate as a percentage the merchant chooses, typically 2 to 5 percent. Card transaction fees are separate: Yoco publishes in-person rates that decline across turnover bands (up to R50k, R50k to R200k, then custom above R200k) and differ by card type (debit, credit, international). Yoco publishes its rates and plan fees excluding VAT; where we show a VAT-inclusive figure it is our own gross-up at 15 percent, shown because that is what you are billed, with the ex-VAT headline alongside. Rates change, so check yoco.com and your own statement for your current figures. Lekka is not a Yoco partner and is not affiliated with Yoco. Lekka figures carry no VAT, because Lekka is not VAT registered. The 60 percent card completion default is measured from live Lekka programme data in August 2026, on the longest-running programme on the platform. Younger programmes complete fewer cards, because their customers are still collecting, so use your own redemption history where you have one.
Why giving away a percentage of every transaction hurts
Have a good month and the bill goes up. Get a regular to spend a bit more, which is the whole point, and the bill goes up again.
To protect your margin you put your prices up. That is the one thing that sends regulars somewhere else.
A stamp costs you the same whether someone spends R40 or R300.
What Lekka costs
One monthly fee, based on how many customers you have. No fee per sale, no cut of your takings, no setup fee, no contract, and no VAT on top.
Questions people ask
No. Lekka has nothing to do with taking payment. Your card machine, your processor and your rates all stay exactly as they are, and you carry on taking cash. Lekka is the loyalty programme that sits alongside them, which is why it can be priced on its own instead of bundled into a payments plan.
Because the cost is a share of turnover rather than a fixed amount. If you fund 3 percent of loyal spend, every extra rand your regulars spend adds three cents to the loyalty bill, forever, so your best and highest-spending customers are the most expensive ones to keep. A stamp costs the same whatever the basket. If your regulars start spending more per visit, which is usually the point, the percentage bill rises and the stamp bill does not. Both models do cost more if people visit more often, and that is the part you actually want to pay for.
Then those cards cost you nothing, which is a real difference between the two models. A percentage reward is funded on the sale itself, so you pay from the customer's very first rand whether or not they ever come back. A stamp programme only costs you when someone completes a card and claims it. On our longest-running programme about 6 cards in 10 get finished, measured in August 2026, so roughly 4 in 10 cost nothing at all. Younger programmes sit lower again, because their cards are still filling up. The calculator defaults to 60 percent and lets you set your own.
It depends on your numbers, and we would rather you worked it out than took our word for it. The two price loyalty in completely different ways, so there is no single answer. What decides it is your loyal turnover, the earn rate you would fund, what a reward costs you to make, and how much spend you require before giving a stamp. Put your own figures into the calculator on this page. It also shows the two costs as a percentage of the same loyal spend, which is the only genuinely like-for-like comparison.
Yes, and most businesses on Lekka do exactly that. Lekka does not integrate with your payment terminal and does not need to. Staff scan the customer's QR code, or the customer scans yours, and the stamp is recorded. Nothing changes at the point of payment, which also means a stamp can be given on a cash sale.
No. They scan a QR code and their loyalty card opens in their phone's browser. There is nothing to install, which is the single biggest reason sign-up rates hold up at the counter.
Paying for loyalty twice?
If your card machine plan already includes loyalty, you would be paying for it twice while you try us. So take 30% off a year, paid up front. Keep your card machine exactly as it is.
Opens an email to our team. Attach your latest bill from your card machine provider, and we will take it from there. If nothing opens, write to us at hello@lekkacard.co.za.
The terms, in full
- 30% off twelve months of any paid plan, in place of our usual 20% annual discount. The two do not stack.
- Paid for the year up front, on an EFT invoice. There is no card on file and nothing is ever charged automatically.
- For businesses already paying a card machine or POS provider for a plan that includes loyalty. Send your most recent bill from them so we can check it, attached to the email.
- Black out anything on that bill you would rather we did not see. We only need the provider, the plan and the date. We check it once, then delete it, and we never share it.
- Annual billing is not refundable. You can cancel whenever you like and it will not renew, but a year you have paid for runs to the end of that year.
- Not combined with the non-profit discount.
- Offer ends 31 December 2026.
Keep your card machine. Run your own loyalty programme.
Free for your first 50 customers. Nothing changes at the point of payment.
Yoco figures as published, 13 August 2026. Lekka is not affiliated with Yoco.