FareHarbor Fees Explained: What Operators and Guests Pay
FareHarbor is often described as free for operators, but someone still pays. Here is how the booking fee works, what it costs your guests and how to compare it fairly.
FareHarbor is one of the best-known booking systems for tours and activities, and it is often described as “free”. For the operator, that can be true in the narrow sense that there is no monthly subscription. But the system is paid for, and understanding who pays, how much and when matters before you choose it, stay on it or move away from it.
This article sets out what FareHarbor itself publishes about its fees, what independent and competitor sources report about the rates, and how to estimate the real cost for your own business. FareHarbor does not publish a rate card, so treat every percentage below as “typically reported” and confirm the figure in your own agreement.
How FareHarbor charges: the booking fee model
FareHarbor’s main revenue comes from a booking fee added to online bookings. According to FareHarbor’s own article Who pays the FareHarbor booking fee?, “the booking fee is paid by the customer when completing a booking through FareHarbor’s booking system”, and the amount is displayed during checkout before the booking is confirmed.
FareHarbor’s Terms of Service for Customers describe the same thing from the guest’s side: a fee “for using the Service to obtain (and make payment for) a reservation”, shown in the booking funnel and collected together with the activity price.
So, by default, the operator does not pay a subscription and the guest pays a percentage on top of the tour price.
How much is the booking fee?
FareHarbor does not publish the percentage. The figures you will see quoted come from third parties:
- Several sources report a fee of about 6% on direct bookings. Bókun, a competitor, says FareHarbor “reportedly” charges 6%.
- TrekkSoft, also a competitor, describes “up to 6%” passed to the customer at checkout, and roughly 2% on API and OTA-routed bookings, paid by the operator.
- CaptainBook quotes 6–8%, depending on the agreement.
A reasonable working assumption is a customer-facing fee of typically around 6%, with individual agreements varying. FareHarbor’s provider terms also allow for an operator-paid commission model instead of the booker-paid fee, so some operators pay the percentage themselves.
Other charges to ask about
The booking fee is not the only line item. FareHarbor’s own legal pages describe further fees that can apply to operators:
- Payment processing. Card fees still apply. Third-party guides quote different processing rates, so ask for yours in writing.
- API bookings. FareHarbor has separate API Fee Terms for bookings received from third-party websites. The fee is calculated from the activity prices in your OTA price sheet, not necessarily the price the OTA charged.
- Other services. Provider terms mention fees for items such as payment infrastructure, private events and the FH Dock product. Hosted websites are typically priced separately.
What the booking fee means for your guests
A 6% fee on a $150 tour adds $9 at checkout. On a family booking of four at $150 each, it adds $36. Your guest sees a higher total than the price on your tour page, and it is worth thinking about how that lands.
Retail research suggests surprise costs at checkout are a real problem. In the Baymard Institute’s checkout survey of US online shoppers, 40% of those who abandoned a checkout said extra costs (shipping, tax, fees) were too high, and 12% said they could not see or calculate the total cost up front. That research covers ecommerce in general rather than tours, but the principle carries over: a fee that appears late in checkout is friction.
Some operators deal with this by building the fee into their advertised price, which FareHarbor’s own article acknowledges. That avoids the surprise, but it means the guest pays the same total and the fee is simply less visible.
Refunds and partial refunds
This is the part many operators only discover when it matters. FareHarbor’s customer terms say:
- Booking fees are non-refundable except as provided in the terms, though FareHarbor may refund them at its discretion.
- If you refund only part of the activity price, FareHarbor “has the right to retain the full amount of the applicable Booking Fee”.
- If you cancel and offer a gift card or voucher, the guest is reimbursed the activity price and FareHarbor keeps the booking fee.
In practice, if bad weather forces you to cancel and you refund the tour price, your guest may still be out of pocket for the booking fee unless FareHarbor chooses to refund it. Guests do not always distinguish between your business and your booking system, so the complaint usually lands with you.
Working out the real annual cost
Because the guest pays the fee, it is tempting to treat it as zero cost to you. A more useful view is that it is part of the total price your guest pays for your tour. Money spent on a booking fee is money the guest is not spending on your tour, an upgrade or a second activity.
Here is a simple way to size it. Take your online booking revenue for the last twelve months and multiply by the fee rate in your agreement.
| Annual online bookings | Fee at 6% (typical reported rate) | Fee at 2% (reported API rate) |
|---|---|---|
| $50,000 | $3,000 | $1,000 |
| $150,000 | $9,000 | $3,000 |
| $300,000 | $18,000 | $6,000 |
| $600,000 | $36,000 | $12,000 |
These figures exclude card processing, which you pay on any system. If some of your volume arrives through OTAs via the API, apply the API rate to that portion and remember that the OTA’s own commission is separate again.
Questions to put to FareHarbor (or any provider)
Before you sign or renew, ask for written answers to these:
- What booking fee percentage applies to my direct online bookings, and can I switch to an operator-paid model?
- What applies to bookings I enter myself, phone bookings and walk-ins?
- What fee applies to bookings received through OTAs and resellers?
- What is my card processing rate, and who holds the merchant account?
- What happens to the booking fee on full refunds, partial refunds and weather cancellations?
- When are payouts made to my bank account?
- What does a hosted website cost, and who owns the domain?
- How do I export my customers, bookings and future departures if I leave?
Alternatives to the booking fee model
There are broadly three ways tour booking software charges:
- Customer-paid booking fee (FareHarbor’s default): no subscription, a percentage added at checkout.
- Operator-paid commission: a percentage taken from each booking, which you either absorb or build into prices.
- Flat subscription: a fixed monthly or yearly price regardless of volume, with only your payment provider’s card fees on top.
None is right for every business. A very small operator with a handful of bookings a month may find a percentage cheaper than any subscription. Once your online revenue grows, a flat fee is usually cheaper, often by a wide margin. Our guide to booking commission vs subscription walks through the break-even calculation in detail.
The other question is where the money goes. With some systems, payments are processed through the software company’s own merchant arrangement and paid out to you on a schedule. With others, payments go straight into your own Stripe, PayPal or local gateway account, and you control refunds and payout timing directly.
If you decide to move
If the numbers point towards a change, plan the move rather than rushing it. Export your customers and bookings, keep the old system running until the bookings made there have taken place, and set up redirects if your booking pages are changing address. Our article on moving to a new booking system without losing data or SEO covers the steps.
How Tourtify compares
Tourtify charges a flat monthly plan with no commission or booking fee on any plan: $39, $79 or $129 a month, or $29, $59 or $99 a month billed yearly. Payments go straight to your own Stripe, PayPal or local gateway account, and your guests pay the price on your tour page. You can import customers and bookings from FareHarbor CSV exports, with a dry run that shows every row before anything is created.
There is a side-by-side breakdown on our Tourtify vs FareHarbor page, full details on the pricing page, and a 30-day free trial that needs no card.