Operating partners spend most of their time hunting for the next 100 to 300 basis points of EBITDA improvement across the portfolio. They look at procurement, headcount, pricing strategy, working capital, and SG&A optimization. What they almost never look at, even though it is sitting on every P&L in the portfolio, is merchant services and bank fees. It is one of the cleanest, most scalable, and most overlooked EBITDA adds available to a PE operator. Here is how to run the playbook.

When a CFO realizes the company is overpaying on credit card processing, the first instinct is almost always the same. Switch processors. It feels decisive. It is also usually the wrong move. In our experience auditing more than $25 billion in monthly receivables, switching is the right answer in fewer than 10 percent of engagements. Here is why an audit recovers more savings, faster, with less operational risk than any processor change.

Most CFOs have never been taught how to read a merchant services statement. That is not a failure of the finance team. It is a feature of the industry. Processors design statements to bury margin in places that look like pass-through costs, and most companies pay them month after month without questioning what is actually inside. Here is a practical walkthrough of the line items that matter, what fair pricing looks like, and where the overcharges typically hide.