C-SPAN: Senate Hearing on Competition in the Credit Card Market
MPC Executive Committee member and National Association of Convenience Stores General Counsel Doug Kantor testifies about rising swipe fees and the need to pass the Credit Card Competition Act before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
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Convenience Store News: Retailer Groups Urge Senate to Change 'Anticompetitive' Swipe Fee System
"Most consumers are not aware of these fees or the effect they have on the cost of goods and services and the U.S. economy, but the effects are dramatic," MPC Executive Committee member and National Association of Convenience Stores General Counsel Doug Kantor said. "For merchants, these excessive and ever-increasing fees are a constant source of stress and financial difficulty, and for consumers they contribute significantly to inflation. In fact, swipe fees reduce efficiency across the economy. "It does not have to be this way," Kantor continued, adding that the Credit Card Competition Act would introduce market competition where none currently exists by creating incentives for innovation on price and service that would benefit both consumers and the economy. "Swipe fees desperately need those incentives but lack them today. The CCCA would deliver on that."
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Payments Dive: Durbin gives credit card bill another Senate push
(MPC Executive Committee member) Doug Kantor, general counsel for a trade group that has been backing the legislation — the National Association of Convenience Stores — noted in an interview this week that the legislation has enjoyed bipartisan support. Co-sponsor Sen. Roger Marshall, a Republican from Kansas, has been spearheading the bill as ardently as Durbin. Other big name Republicans have also signed on, including Vice President-Elect J.D. Vance and Sen. Josh Hawley.
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NACS Daily: Senate Judiciary Committee to Hold Hearing on Swipe Fees
“We look forward to this hearing because we want as many opportunities as possible to talk about the growing financial hardship excessive swipe fees have caused for American families, small businesses and the economy,” MPC executive committee member and NACS General Counsel Doug Kantor said. “The card industry, on the other hand, wants to hide the facts and pretend the problem doesn’t exist."
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The Center Square: As giving season arrives, calls for an end to swipe fees on donations
While many banks oppose the proposed legislation, a survey by the Merchants Payments Coalition found that a majority of Americans support the Credit Card Competition Act. "According to the survey, 55% of likely voters in this fall’s general election support the CCCA while only 7% oppose it, and 38% are unsure," a news release accompanying the survey says. "Supporters outnumber opponents by nearly 50 percentage points."
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American Banker: Swipe fees get renewed Washington focus in aftermath of election
While Durbin and Republican lead cosponsor Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., made a show of inviting the executives of the two card networks, neither are listed as attending the hearing. "The card industry, on the other hand, wants to hide the facts and pretend the problem doesn't exist," said the Merchant Payments Coalition executive committee member and National Association of Convenience Stores general counsel Doug Kantor in a statement. "That's why Visa and Mastercard's CEOs have refused to show up for a hearing and have fought to avoid any hearings or votes on legislation to bring desperately needed competition to the broken payments market."
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Chain Drug Review: Senate Judiciary Committee to address rising credit card “swipe” fees
“We look forward to this hearing because we want as many opportunities as possible to talk about the growing financial hardship excessive swipe fees have caused for American families, small businesses, and the economy,” said Doug Kantor, a member of MPC’s Executive Committee and General Counsel for the National Association of Convenience Stores.
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Digital Transactions: How Illinois’s Interchange Case Has Transfixed the Industry
The Illinois Retail Merchants Association, the Illinois Fuel and Retail Association, the National Association of Convenience Stores, the National Retail Federation, and FMI, the food-industry association, are the merchant groups that this fall filed a request to intervene in the case as defendants. The groups requested to join the suit because they feel they could provide the court with more facts and insights about how the payments system works. The move is part of an effort to refute plaintiffs’ claims that the law will negatively disrupt the payments system, according to Doug Kantor, (MPC Executive Committee member and) general counsel for the National Association of Convenience Stores.
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Digital Transactions: Who Will Benefit Most Becomes the Latest Flash Point in the Battle Over the Illinois Interchange Law
“Merchants that receive a lot of tips and pay the most in excise taxes are small merchants,” says Doug Kantor, (MPC Executive Committee member and) general counsel for the National Association of Convenience Stores, which has petitioned the court to join the lawsuit as a defendant. Excluding how much merchants will save by not paying interchange on tips and excise taxes raises serious questions about the report’s accuracy, Kantor argues. “The [report’s] numbers aren’t accurate, because they’ve been cherry-picked to show only the largest merchants would see the biggest savings,” Kantor says. “It’s as though they want to rescore the World Series to show only runs scored by base hits as opposed to all runs scored. [The EPC] is not looking at the law as a whole. Instead, it’s using the data to support a false narrative it has created so there is a bogeyman.”
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Center Square: Controversial swipe fee law in Illinois goes to court
"The U.S. credit card industry will still collect the highest fees in the world, even with the Illinois law in place,” said National Association of Convention Stores General Counsel (and MPC Executive Committee member) Doug Kantor. “There is no justification for slowing the Illinois law from taking effect.”
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