Why we charge zero commission

Booking software used to be a tool you bought. Somewhere along the way it became a landlord you pay rent to: a percentage of your own chair.

The math nobody puts on the pricing page

The two biggest names in our corner of the market both charge commission on top of the subscription. Fresha takes 20% on every new client that finds you through its marketplace, with a minimum of $6 (£4) per client. Booksy’s Boost takes 30% of a new client’s first visit: minimum $10, up to $100.

Run the numbers on your own shop. Say a first visit at your place is $40. Boost’s cut is $12. You did the work, bought the products, paid the rent on the chair, and kept $28. Now ask the harder question: was that client actually new? Marketplace apps are where your existing clients go to rebook, and every new-client flag is decided by the platform, not by you.

Those prices are as of August 2026. Verify them yourself: pabau.com/blog/fresha-pricing · biz.booksy.com.

The deeper cost isn’t the percentage

Commission models need your clients to belong to the platform. That’s why marketplace profiles show your competitors next to your reviews, why the app owns the client’s booking history, and why leaving feels impossible after a year or two. The commission is the visible part; the client relationship is what’s actually being taken.

A barbershop’s entire economics run on regulars. The client who comes every two weeks for a decade isn’t a “conversion”. They’re the business. Software that charges you each time the platform “brings” them back has its incentives pointed at the wrong person.

What we charge instead

Shearlane is a flat monthly price per location. That’s the model, whole:

• Subscription: €19, €39 or €89 a month, depending on plan. No per-client fees, no marketplace, no cut of your chair. Ever.
• Card processing: Stripe’s published rate for your country plus a 0.5% Shearlane platform fee, itemized on every payout. This is cost recovery, not a business model.
• WhatsApp messages: every plan includes a monthly allowance, and packs are priced near carrier cost. We never sell “unlimited”, because WhatsApp charges us per template and pretending otherwise would just hide the number in your subscription.

If Shearlane ever needs a growth trick, it will not be a percentage of your work. That’s not a promo. It’s the founding rule, and it’s written into every pricing page we ship.