A Detailed Evaluation of PCI DSS Certification Cost

There is no fixed price on the costs involved with becoming PCI DSS (Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards) compliant. Instead, the costs largely depend on the size of your business, the volume of transactions your company conducts annually, and the transmission and storage methods you use.

PCI DSS is designed to ensure the security and integrity of a user’s cardholder data environment. And so, the compliance framework requires every organization processing online transactions to become PCI DSS compliant. If any organization in the scope of PCI DSS is found to be non-compliant, there are significant repercussions. We’ll cover the non-compliance angle in detail further in the article.

Read on for insights into the components of the PCI DSS process (SAQ, ROC, Annual Maintenance cost), the cost for each component, and get an estimate of how much the compliance process would cost you.

How much does PCI DSS compliance cost? (Quick overview)

The PCI DSS compliance certification costs between $50,000 to $200,000 for a large organization to get a RoC (Report on Compliance). A small organization could incur between $5,000 to $20,000 for processing fewer than 1 million card transactions per year. 

The PCI DSS compliance process involves many variables, which are directly impacted by the requirements that your organization will have to comply with to maintain compliance. Hence, getting an accurate cost calculation on how much the PCI DSS process might cost your organization is not readily available.

But here’s a simple logic – a small organization, with fewer employees, that does not process a vast volume of online transactions will incur a lower cost to become compliant as compared to an enterprise that processes millions of transactions annually.

Another factor that impacts the PCI DSS certification cost is the existing security culture of the organization. If your organization already has a strong security culture, follows safe coding practices, and promotes data security in its everyday operations, the cost would be significantly lower; as you would already have systems and policies in place that PCI DSS mandates.

How to calculate PCI DSS certification cost?

As we mentioned, the PCI DSS audit costs largely depend on your organization’s PCI compliance level and your existing infrastructure. You can get an exact estimate of how much a PCI DSS certification costs with our compliance cost calculator. We have provided ballpark estimates for each stage below.

Network security

PCI DSS mandates that you have a list of network security measures in place, including encryption, DDoS mitigation, unauthorized access detection, etc. 

You would also need to assign an internal resource to ensure that your business environments are monitored around the clock.

This activity typically costs around $2400 annually when you hire an external resource. And, this cost is not inclusive of the cost you’ll incur to set up the tools required for the job.

Data encryption

PCI DSS mandates encrypting customer data to ensure security. You will either have to have an internal resource working on