--- title: Research | Ordr description: Field reports and the 2026 Venue Payments Report, with every external figure sourced and dated, and a published list of the claims Ordr will not make. --- [![Ordr](https://ordr.io/hubfs/New%20Ordr%20Pictures/brand-ordr-wordmark.png)Commerce Intelligence](https://ordr.io/?hsLang=io) Platform Solutions Research Customers [Schedule a demo](https://ordr.io/research#demo) [![Ordr Pay](https://ordr.io/hubfs/New%20Ordr%20Pictures/brand-ordr-pay.svg)](https://ordr.io/pay?hsLang=io)[**Merchant processing**Interchange optimised, gateway agnostic, no headline rate games](https://ordr.io/pay#processing)[**Virtual payments**Text to pay, email links, and a PCI compliant agent portal](https://ordr.io/pay#virtual)[**Agentic payments**Machine initiated purchase, on rails that already shipped](https://ordr.io/pay#agentic)[**Alternative payments**Wallets, PIN debit, pay by bank, and stablecoin settlement](https://ordr.io/pay#alternative) [![Ordr Insights](https://ordr.io/hubfs/New%20Ordr%20Pictures/brand-ordr-insights.svg)](https://ordr.io/insight?hsLang=io)[**Fan IQ**One fan profile across ticketing, concessions, retail, and premium](https://ordr.io/insight#fan-iq)[**Partner IQ**Attribution your partners can renew against, not impressions](https://ordr.io/insight#partner-iq)[**Transact IQ**Every rate, every downgrade, every overcharge, in one view](https://ordr.io/insight#transact-iq) Live**Fan IQ is live with Ticketmaster** Ticketing, entry, concessions, retail, and partner activation resolved to one fan. [Read the case study →](https://ordr.io/customers/ticketmaster?hsLang=io) #### By role [**Finance**Rate visibility, dispute exposure, and a close that lands the same night](https://ordr.io/solutions/finance?hsLang=io)[**Partnerships**Prove what an activation delivered before the renewal conversation](https://ordr.io/solutions/partnerships?hsLang=io)[**Ticketing**Join the seat to the sale without leaving your ticketing platform](https://ordr.io/solutions/ticketing?hsLang=io)[**Operations**One system across gate, counter, retail, and premium](https://ordr.io/solutions/operations?hsLang=io)[**Technology**One integration layer instead of nine vendor relationships](https://ordr.io/solutions/technology?hsLang=io) #### By moment [Gate and entry](https://ordr.io/solutions/moments#gate) [Concessions and retail](https://ordr.io/solutions/moments#concessions) [Premium and suites](https://ordr.io/solutions/moments#premium) [Partner activation](https://ordr.io/solutions/moments#partner) #### Field reports [**The 2026 Venue Payments Report**What changed at the counter this season, and what it cost](https://ordr.io/research#report)[**Custody, compliance, and the cost of a fragmented stack**Data ownership, card security standards, and dispute economics](https://ordr.io/research/field-report-01?hsLang=io)[**All research**Everything Ordr has published, with sources](https://ordr.io/research?hsLang=io) #### Company [**News**Announcements, partnerships, and coverage](https://ordr.io/news?hsLang=io)[**About Ordr**Who we are and why we built this](https://ordr.io/about?hsLang=io) Free**The 2026 Venue Payments Report** Built from network transaction data and interviews with finance leads across sports and live entertainment. [Get the report →](https://ordr.io/research#report) #### Proof [**Case studies**Named clubs, measured results, stated method](https://ordr.io/customers?hsLang=io)[**Vegas Golden Knights**55 bps off interchange and $82.5k in chargebacks recovered](https://ordr.io/customers/golden-knights?hsLang=io)[**Pittsburgh Penguins**A dozen vendors consolidated, 53% off processing in 60 days](https://ordr.io/customers/penguins?hsLang=io)[**Ticketmaster**The integration that joins the ticket to the counter](https://ordr.io/customers/ticketmaster?hsLang=io) #### Trust [**Trust and security**Certifications, architecture, and who owns the fan record](https://ordr.io/trust?hsLang=io)[**How we handle data**What we hold, why we hold it, and for how long](https://ordr.io/trust#custody) Trusted by**The clubs, the resorts, and the rails** NHL, AHL, CFL and WNBA clubs, MLS, a Las Vegas resort, and the platforms underneath them. [See the roster →](https://ordr.io/customers?hsLang=io) # Every number here has a *source*. Ordr publishes research the same way it publishes client results: with the source named, the date attached, and a list of the things we went looking for and could not verify. [Get the 2026 report →](https://ordr.io/research#report)[Read field report 01](https://ordr.io/research/field-report-01?hsLang=io) **28**Pages in the 2026 report **8**External figures cleared for publication **6**Common category claims we will not make **0**Statistics without a link ## The 2026 Venue Payments Report What changed at the counter this season, what it cost, and what a team can actually do about it. Twenty eight pages, every external figure sourced and dated, and a published list of the claims this category repeats that we could not verify. 01 **The fee line**A record year, and the number you can actually move 02 **Disputes**The April threshold change, quantified 03 **The rails**Five agentic launches, all already shipped #### Get the report Straight to your inbox. No sales call attached. Send me the report → 28 pagesNo paywallNo sales callSources included **Here it is.**The report opens in a new tab. If your browser blocked it, [download it here](https://ordr.io/hubfs/venue-payments-report-2026.pdf?hsLang=io). ## Written for procurement. Long form, referenced, and built to be taken into a vendor conversation rather than read once and forgotten. [**Field report 01** 12References 11 minReading time Aug 2026Published Custody, compliance and the cost of a fragmented stack. Who owns the fan record, what "secure" has to mean in 2026, the reference architecture that keeps the funds path and the data path separate, and why the dispute math changed in April. Read the report →](https://ordr.io/research/field-report-01?hsLang=io)[**The 2026 Venue Payments Report** 28Pages GatedWork email only 2026Season What changed at the counter this season and what it cost. The swipe fee line, the new dispute thresholds, the rails that shipped while nobody was looking, and what each one is worth to a team. Get the report →](https://ordr.io/research#report) ![A payment terminal at a bar counter](https://ordr.io/hubfs/New%20Ordr%20Pictures/img-premium-hospitality-terminal.jpg) ## Sources, or silence. If a claim cannot be traced to a named organisation, a document and a date, it does not appear on this site. That rule cost us several statistics this category repeats freely, and the list of them is published below. [See what we will not claim](https://ordr.io/research#unverified) ## Eight numbers. Eight sources. Each of these was confirmed by opening the cited page and reading the figure there. Re-check anything time sensitive before quoting it. 76%Primary source of US B2C marketing executives who invested in sports sponsorship in 2024 agree or strongly agree that they struggle to calculate the ROI. A further 39 percent planned to increase investment in 2025 and 28 percent planned to enter the category for the first time. Forrester, Q4 2024 CMO Pulse Survey[Open the source →](https://www.forrester.com/blogs/sports-sponsorships-surge-despite-fuzzy-roi) $198.25BNamed secondary source paid by US merchants in combined credit and debit card swipe fees in 2025, up from $187.2 billion in 2024. Nilson Report figures, March 2026[Open the source →](https://merchantspaymentscoalition.com/credit-and-debit-card-swipe-fees-reach-record-19825-billion-president-and-congress-call-action) $82 + $46Primary source the internal cost and the third party fees a US merchant carries on a single chargeback, before the value of the lost goods. Mastercard, updated June 2026[Open the source →](https://www.mastercard.com/global/en/news-and-trends/Insights/2025/what-s-the-true-cost-of-a-chargeback-in-2025.html) 150 bpsPrimary source the Visa Acquirer Monitoring Program merchant excessive threshold from 1 April 2026, down from 220. Measured by transaction count, which is the worst case for a game night. Visa VAMP fact sheet, 2025[Open the source →](https://corporate.visa.com/content/dam/VCOM/corporate/visa-perspectives/security-and-trust/documents/visa-acquirer-monitoring-program-fact-sheet-2025.pdf) 0.73%Primary source average debit interchange ad valorem overall, and 0.47 percent on regulated transactions, on 2023 data. Federal Reserve Board, December 2025[Open the source →](https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/pressreleases/bcreg20251219b.htm) v4.0.1Primary source the active PCI DSS version. v3.2.1 retired on 31 March 2024, and the 51 future dated requirements in v4.0 became mandatory on 31 March 2025. PCI Security Standards Council[Open the source →](https://blog.pcisecuritystandards.org/just-published-pci-dss-v4-0-1) $4.44MPrimary source the global average cost of a data breach in 2025, down 9 percent year on year. Financial services averaged $5.56 million. IBM Cost of a Data Breach 2025[Open the source →](https://www.ibm.com/think/x-force/2025-cost-of-a-data-breach-navigating-ai) $28TPrimary source in real economic stablecoin volume in 2025, growing at a 133 percent compound annual rate since 2023. Chainalysis, April 2026[Open the source →](https://www.chainalysis.com/blog/stablecoin-utility-future-of-payments/) ## Agentic payments are not a forecast. Five production launches between April 2025 and June 2026 mean machine initiated purchase is a present tense gap for anyone selling tickets, not a future risk. [See agentic payments →](https://ordr.io/pay#agentic) ## Five launches, fourteen months. Each one is a primary newsroom announcement with a date on it. The question for a club is not whether this arrives, it is whether the team’s inventory is addressable when a machine tries to buy from it. **01** Mastercard Agent Pay*29 April 2025* *Agentic tokens for AI initiated purchases.* **02** Stripe and OpenAI Agentic Commerce Protocol*29 September 2025* *Instant Checkout inside ChatGPT.* **03** Visa Trusted Agent Protocol*14 October 2025* *Cryptographic agent signatures for intent, recognition and payment.* **04** PayPal Agentic Commerce Services*28 October 2025* *AI driven shopping on PayPal rails.* **05** Mastercard Agent Pay for Machines*10 June 2026* *Machine to machine transactions across cards, accounts and stablecoins, with more than thirty launch partners.* ## Six things with no source. Each of these was searched thoroughly and no citable source exists. They are common in this category. Several of them have appeared in decks we have been shown. None of them will appear on an Ordr page. 01**What clubs spend on fan data infrastructure** Deloitte's sports industry outlook, PwC's sports outlook and Sports Innovation Lab were all checked. None publishes a figure. Any dollar number you have seen for this, including the ones that circulate in pitch decks, does not have a source behind it. 02**The share of attendees a club can identify** No source anywhere. This is where "the average venue knows 23 percent of its fans" comes from, and it comes from nowhere. 03**The number of disconnected systems a typical team runs** We say nine because that is what Ordr integrates in a full estate. It is a description of our own work, not an industry statistic, and we will not present it as one. 04**Sponsorship renewal rates broken out by measurement quality** This is the origin of "85 percent versus 50 percent". There is no study behind it. 05**Level 2 and Level 3 interchange qualification savings** Only processor marketing blogs carry numbers, and they do not agree with each other. 06**That 60 percent of small businesses close within six months of a cyber attack** Traced and unsourceable. It spread through Congressional testimony without an origin. The GENIUS Act was signed into law on 18 July 2025 and implementing rulemaking is still in progress. The CLARITY Act has not passed and does not legalise stablecoins. Anyone telling you otherwise is describing a bill, not a law. ## Argue with the method. If you think a figure here is wrong, or you have a source we missed, tell us and we will correct the page. That is a real offer and it has been taken up. > Switching to Ordr was one of the smartest and easiest decisions we've made. By moving our payments under Ordr, we gained visibility into hidden costs and started unlocking valuable, revenue-driving data. **Mike Dillon**Chief Financial Officer, Pittsburgh Penguins First name Last name Work email Organisation Phone optional How can we help?Choose oneLower what we pay in card feesTake payments away from a terminalGet usable data out of our transactionsProve what our partners actually deliveredReplace several vendors with oneSomething else, or not sure yet Send a correction We use this to route you to the right person. No sequence, no drip. ### Thank you. Your request is in. Someone from Ordr will reply directly, usually within one business day. [![Ordr](https://ordr.io/hubfs/New%20Ordr%20Pictures/brand-ordr-wordmark.png)](https://ordr.io/?hsLang=io) The commerce intelligence layer for sports and live entertainment. One ledger across ticketing, the counter, retail and premium. #### Platform [Ordr Pay](https://ordr.io/pay?hsLang=io)[Merchant processing](https://ordr.io/pay#processing)[Virtual payments](https://ordr.io/pay#virtual)[Agentic payments](https://ordr.io/pay#agentic)[Alternative payments](https://ordr.io/pay#alternative)[Ordr Insights](https://ordr.io/insight?hsLang=io)[Fan IQ](https://ordr.io/insight#fan-iq)[Partner IQ](https://ordr.io/insight#partner-iq)[Transact IQ](https://ordr.io/insight#transact-iq) #### By role [Finance](https://ordr.io/solutions/finance?hsLang=io)[Partnerships](https://ordr.io/solutions/partnerships?hsLang=io)[Ticketing](https://ordr.io/solutions/ticketing?hsLang=io)[Operations](https://ordr.io/solutions/operations?hsLang=io)[Technology](https://ordr.io/solutions/technology?hsLang=io)[By moment](https://ordr.io/solutions/moments?hsLang=io) #### Customers [Case studies](https://ordr.io/customers?hsLang=io)[Vegas Golden Knights](https://ordr.io/customers/golden-knights?hsLang=io)[Pittsburgh Penguins](https://ordr.io/customers/penguins?hsLang=io)[Ticketmaster](https://ordr.io/customers/ticketmaster?hsLang=io)[Trust and security](https://ordr.io/trust?hsLang=io) #### Company [About Ordr](https://ordr.io/about?hsLang=io)[News](https://ordr.io/news?hsLang=io)[Research](https://ordr.io/research?hsLang=io)[Venue Payments Report](https://ordr.io/research#report)[Schedule a demo](https://ordr.io/research#demo) © 2026 Ordr Technologies Inc. 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