Cheaper than $9, until the month gets large.

Stripe is cheaper when the month stays small

Say this first. For a studio whose clients pay less than about $2,250 in a month, Stripe Invoicing Starter costs less than Incusia. There is no seat. You pay 0.4% of what is actually paid. A $1,000 invoice is $4. Two of those are $8. Incusia Starter is $9 whether or not anyone pays. If that is your year, stay on Stripe.

The page people quote as "0.4% capped at $2" is not the invoicing page. On Stripe's US pricing page, also checked 7 November 2026, post-payment invoices are 0.4% of the transaction with a $2 cap. Those are invoices generated after a one-time purchase. Invoicing Starter, on stripe.com/invoicing/pricing, is 0.4% per paid invoice and does not print a cap. Plus is 0.5% per paid invoice and adds quotes. Custom pricing is a sales conversation for large amounts.

Incusia collects cards through Stripe. It does not put you on Stripe Invoicing, so you do not pay the 0.4% invoicing fee on an Incusia invoice. You pay $9 for the software. If the client pays by card, Stripe's processing fee is on top of either product. That card rate is not the comparison. A percentage bill of a different shape is the PayPal invoicing page. An estimate you can send before the invoice exists is the estimate generator.

Stripe Invoicing Starter
fee = amount paid × 0.004
No cap is printed on stripe.com/invoicing/pricing.

$1,000 paid  → $4.00
$2,250 paid  → $9.00
$5,000 paid  → $20.00
$10,000 paid → $40.00

Card processing is on top.
The $2 cap is a different line: post-payment invoices.

What Stripe already includes

Invoicing Starter is not a blank payment link. The pricing page includes a hosted invoice page, insights, a customer portal, automatic collection with smart retries and automatic email reminders, and reconciliation of invoices paid by ACH credit or wire. You can create the invoice from the Dashboard, which Stripe describes as no code, or from the API. A developer who already sends from the API does not need another product to press send.

Quotes, which Stripe describes as an initial estimate before the invoice, are on Plus at 0.5%, not on Starter. Recurring invoices are Stripe Billing, a separate price, not a line on the invoicing page. Incusia puts estimates a client can sign on Starter, and recurring invoices on Pro at $29. If the only missing piece is a quote, Plus at 0.5% may still be cheaper than $9 until the month is large. Do that math on your own paid total before you switch.

• Starter: 0.4% per paid invoice. No subscription. No cap printed.
• Plus: 0.5% per paid invoice, and quotes.
• Reminders, a hosted page, and a customer portal are included on Starter.
• Recurring invoices are Billing, not Invoicing Starter.

Where a non-developer actually feels the difference

The fee is not why most people leave Stripe Invoicing. The Dashboard is. Customers, products, reminders, and the invoice are settings in a payments product. That is the right home if you set the account up and you like it. It is a poor home if the person sending the invoice is not the person who integrated Stripe. Incusia is a client list, an estimate the client can sign, templates, and a dashboard that shows what was sent and what was paid. Automatic reminders are on Starter, Pro, and Lifetime. Stripe has reminders too. The difference is that they sit next to the estimate and the client, not inside a processor.

A handful of large invoices is the expensive Stripe case, not the cheap one. Three invoices of $4,000 are $12,000 paid, and 0.4% of that is $48, against $9. If your "handful" is three invoices of $600, that is $7.20, and Stripe wins. Write the real month down before you treat either sentence as yours. There is no free Incusia plan waiting under the trial. The trial is 7 days of full Pro access, no card, and then a paid plan.