Why "what does Treatwell cost?" works differently than you think
The question "what does Treatwell cost per month?" has no simple monthly amount as an answer, and that confuses many salon owners. Treatwell is not salon software with a fixed subscription price, it is a marketplace. You do not pay it for the use of a calendar, you pay for the new clients the platform brings to you. That is a fundamentally different cost model, and anyone who confuses it with a fixed software subscription quickly makes the wrong sum.
The Treatwell commission model raises the most questions, precisely because the percentage sounds high: 35%. But that percentage does not apply to everything, and it is important to understand exactly what it does and does not cover. If you do not, you estimate your costs either far too high or far too low.
In this guide I set out the Treatwell commission model factually: what the 35% applies to, what it does not apply to, which transaction fees come with it, and how it compares to a fixed subscription and to a pay-per-appointment model. This is about the Dutch salon market, where Treatwell operates. No judgment on whether Treatwell is good or bad; for client acquisition it can work excellently. Just the figures and the right interpretation, so you know what you really pay.
What is Treatwell, and why is it not a software subscription?
Treatwell is an online booking marketplace for beauty and hair salons. Clients search the platform for a salon nearby, compare offerings and reviews, and book directly through Treatwell. For the client it is a place to find you; for the salon it is an acquisition channel that brings in new clients you might not otherwise have reached. How that commission model compares to software such as CelerBook is set out in the comparison between CelerBook and Treatwell.
That is something other than salon software. A fixed software subscription (such as Salonized, which Treatwell acquired outright on 9 October 2024) gives you a calendar, client management, and a booking page for a fixed monthly price. You pay for the tool to run your salon. At Treatwell the tool sits in Treatwell Pro, the business side that runs through the partner portal, from 35 EUR excluding VAT a month for the Starter plan, and on top of that the platform charges a percentage on the clients it brings in.
The result: your costs with Treatwell do not scale with "how much software do I use", but with "how many new clients do I bring in through the platform". The more successful your acquisition through the marketplace, the more commission you pay. That is logical from the model, but it also means it is not a replacement for your daily salon administration. Most salons that use Treatwell run their own calendar and repeat clients in a separate system.
The commission model: what exactly does the 35% apply to?
This is the heart of the guide, and the part where most confusion sits. The figures, with source:
Treatwell charges 35% commission on new bookings that come in through the platform. "New" is the key word here: it is about clients Treatwell brings to you, so people who find your salon through the marketplace and book there. On that new booking you hand over 35% of the treatment amount.
In addition, 2% transaction fees apply to online payments processed through the platform. That 2% comes on top of the commission, and covers the handling of the payment itself when the client pays online through Treatwell.
Source: treatwell.nl/partners/prijzen, checked June 2026. Rates and terms may change; always check Treatwell's current partner page.
Important: the 35% does not apply to your own repeat clients. A client who once came in through Treatwell but then rebooks directly with you (by phone, through your own booking page, or at the front desk) does not fall under the 35% commission on new bookings. The commission is meant as a fee for acquiring a new client, not as a perpetual tax on everyone who ever came through the platform. Exactly for that reason it is unfair to say "Treatwell costs 35% of my revenue": it costs 35% of your new, via-Treatwell-acquired bookings.
That distinction determines whether Treatwell is expensive or actually reasonable for your situation. A salon that mainly uses the platform to occasionally bring in a new client who then returns loyally pays relatively little commission over the lifetime of that client. A salon that lets many new bookings stream in through Treatwell every month pays 35% on that inflow again every month.
A worked example: what does the commission cost in practice?
Numbers make it sharp. Take a salon that gets 20 new bookings through Treatwell in a month, each with a treatment amount of 40 EUR.
The sum: 20 bookings x 40 EUR x 35% commission = 280 EUR commission that month, only on those 20 new via-Treatwell bookings. If those clients pay online through the platform, 2% transaction fees on those bookings come on top.
Set that next to a fixed software subscription starting at 21 EUR ex VAT per month, and the difference is enormous: 280 EUR commission against 21 EUR fixed software cost. At first glance Treatwell looks more than thirteen times as expensive. But that is an unfair comparison, because the two pay for different things. The 280 EUR is the price for 20 new clients you might not otherwise have had; the 21 EUR is the price for the software to run your salon. It is not either-or, they are two different cost items.
The right interpretation: see the 35% as an acquisition cost per new client, not as a software price. The question is then not "is 35% expensive?", but "do I earn that new client back?". If a via-Treatwell client of 40 EUR then rebooks directly with you five more times without commission, that one commission of 14 EUR (35% of 40 EUR) has earned you a client worth 240 EUR in total revenue. Seen that way, the commission is an investment in acquisition, provided the client returns.
The three cost models side by side
Three ways of paying for the same thing, and they answer different questions.
| Model | What you pay | What it buys |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed subscription | From 21 EUR ex VAT a month at Salonized, from 35 EUR ex VAT at Treatwell Pro | The software, whatever your volume that month |
| Marketplace commission | 35% of a new client's first booking, 0% on their repeat visits (365-day window per a Salonized help article) | The new client, not the software |
| Pay per appointment | 0.25 EUR ex VAT per completed appointment, first 5 each month free, capped at 30 EUR ex VAT plus 5 EUR per extra staff member | The software, in proportion to what you actually booked |
A subscription is predictable and blind to volume: a quiet January costs the same as a busy December. A commission works the other way round, it costs nothing until the marketplace delivers someone, and then it takes a share of that first treatment. Pay per appointment sits in between, because the bill follows your calendar and a full month never passes the cap. Most salons end up with two of the three, so the useful question is which model carries your fixed cost and which one carries your acquisition.
Same number of new clients, different amount: nail salon versus massage practice
Because the commission is a percentage, it works out differently as the treatment amount changes. A nail salon and a massage practice that bring in the same number of new clients through Treatwell end up paying a very different commission amount.
Take a nail salon with 10 new bookings through Treatwell in a month, each with a treatment amount of 25 EUR. The commission: 10 x 25 EUR x 35% = 87.50 EUR that month.
Now take a massage practice with the same count, 10 new bookings, but with a treatment amount of 90 EUR per session. The commission: 10 x 90 EUR x 35% = 315 EUR that month, well over three and a half times as much as the nail salon, even though both gained the same number of new clients.
So the 35% does not hit every business equally hard. At a low treatment amount such as a nail salon, the commission per new client stays relatively small. At a high treatment amount such as a massage practice, that same 35% adds up fast, and it matters all the more whether that client then returns without commission.
To place Treatwell well it helps to put the three cost models in the salon world side by side. They are not competitors in the same category; they solve different things.
| Model | Example | Cost structure | When it makes sense |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marketplace commission | Treatwell (35% new bookings + 2% transaction) | Pays per new client through the platform | Client acquisition |
| Fixed subscription | Salonized (21 to 59 EUR/month) | Fixed monthly price, regardless of volume | Predictable, high volume |
| Pay-per-appointment | Usage model (around 0.25 EUR/appointment, with monthly cap) | Scales with appointments, capped | Low-to-medium volume, no contract |
Source: treatwell.nl/en/partners/pricing, fetched on 10 September 2026. Treatwell publishes only the Starter rate; the higher tiers are not public. Amounts exclude VAT.
What the table makes clear: the marketplace model and the two software models do not measure the same thing. The marketplace charges per acquired client and is an acquisition instrument. That distinction is worked through further in the guide on Salonized versus Treatwell. A fixed subscription and a pay-per-appointment model charge for the software to run your salon, with a fixed price and a price that scales with your appointments respectively.
For most salons the practical conclusion is that these models do not exclude each other. You may use the marketplace to acquire new clients, and alongside it a software model to run your calendar, repeat clients, and administration. Adding up the costs then means: commission on your platform acquisition plus your fixed or variable software costs. Anyone who looks only at the 35% figure and confuses it with software price is comparing two things that are not comparable.
Where the transaction fees and online payments come from
The 2% transaction fees deserve their own note, because they stand apart from the commission and are often overlooked. When a client pays online for a treatment through the Treatwell platform, the platform processes that payment. For that handling Treatwell charges 2% of the amount paid.
That is a common mechanism with online payments: a percentage per transaction covers the costs of payment processing, fraud prevention, and payout. It is not unique to Treatwell; payment providers in general charge a comparable percentage. The important point for your sum: count that 2% in when you want to know the real cost of a via-Treatwell, online-paid booking. On a booking of 40 EUR that is 80 cents in transaction fees on top of the 14 EUR commission.
Not every booking runs through an online payment. If the client pays at the front desk or in another way, there is no online payment transaction through the platform and no 2% on that part. So it pays to track which share of your Treatwell bookings is settled online through the platform, because that determines how much in transaction fees you actually pay.
How to put this in motion starting next week
No rushed decision to use Treatwell or not, but a sober calculation of what it brings you against what it costs.
Week 1: count how many new clients you got through Treatwell over the past three months, and how much commission you paid on them. Convert to an average commission per new client.
Week 2: look at how many of those via-Treatwell clients then returned directly. That determines whether the one-off commission earns itself back over the lifetime of the client.
Week 3: separate the two cost items in your head. Treatwell is your acquisition channel (commission per new client). Your daily calendar, repeat clients, and administration run on a software model. Calculate those two apart.
Week 4: choose a software model that fits your volume, apart from Treatwell. At variable or low volume pay-per-appointment can be more favorable than a fixed subscription.
For that daily salon administration, CelerBook offers online appointment booking with your own booking page, automatic SMS reminders and confirmation emails, client management sorted by last visit, staff scheduling with working hours per staff member, and a separate price per staff member for the same service. You pay 0.25 EUR ex VAT per completed appointment, the first 5 per month free, with a cap of a maximum of 30 EUR per month for a solo operator. Pay-as-you-go, no fixed contract. Try CelerBook for free.