What hidden costs should a new prop firm budget for?
Quick answer
Commonly overlooked costs are payment processor reserves and chargebacks, KYC checks before payouts, affiliate commissions, refunds, platform overage fees above account limits, revenue shares, currency conversion, accounting and legal updates, and the extra support needed after a promotion or a market event.
Detailed answer
Costs that surprise new founders:
- Rolling reserves: high-risk processors may hold a percentage of sales for months.
- Chargebacks: fees per dispute, plus the lost sale.
- Overage fees: platforms with account limits may charge per account above the limit.
- Revenue shares: a percentage of sales grows as you grow.
- KYC: a cost per verification at payout time.
- Affiliate commission: often your largest acquisition cost.
- Promotions: discounts reduce the fee while payout liability stays the same.
- Support spikes: news events and breaches create bursts of tickets.
When choosing technology, ask for the total cost at your expected volume, including overage and any revenue share. PropExecutor's model is deliberately simple: no setup fee, no monthly fee, no revenue share and no volume fee. Each account you create uses one prepaid credit, whatever its size.
A simple defence
Before signing with any supplier, ask for the total cost in a quiet month, an average month and a busy month. Hidden costs usually appear in one of the three.
PropExecutor team · Updated