So if you’re interested in purchasing a card reader for your small business and not sure which one to go for, then we suggest reading our SumUp review.

Zettle's closest rival is Square, another software provider that released a small business card reader at a similar time. The SumUp App also gives you access to our full range of merchant services for small businesses, including invoices, issuing receipts, and seeing your transaction history. Despite its need for Wifi, Bluetooth and a smartphone, the Air reader has the best battery life out of the three models available. A single, full charge provides you with the capability to complete up to 500 transactions. Whereas the other two models are slightly more power hungry with the Solo achieving 100 and the 3G only achieving 50, but the built in printer may have something to answer for with that!

Alternative Card Readers

If the above has maybe been a little too transparent and insightful or you’ve reached the end of our review and decided SumUp isn’t for you, it is of course worth exploring the alternatives.

Of course this is all subjective. Customer service support is available via telephone Monday - Friday 8am - 7pm, and Saturday/Sunday 8am - 5pm. He said: “I find Zettle easy to use and straightforward. It has everything we need. I love that it is small and easily transportable so that customers can pay at their tables. The software is also really easy to use, and accessible for my customers. I haven’t considered switching to a different device and don’t plan to any time soon.”

Of the pay-as-you-go solutions, SumUp is known for having the lowest transaction fees. Their other terminal, SumUp Air, also accepts cards at 1.69% per transaction. Small businesses can use Zettle with third-party hardware – including receipt printers, cash drawers, and barcode scanners – as part of a complete POS system. An additional feature of the 3G Printer is that it also works as a charging cradle: when the printer is plugged into a power supply and the card reader is attached to it, both the printer and the reader will be charged. Dreadful customer service. The card reader stopped working for “misuse” while it was boxed and switched off.” Kate, 2022