Merchants Welcome New Senate Cosponsors of Credit Card Competition Act
MPC welcomed the addition of three new Senate sponsors of the Credit Card Competition Act.
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Merchants Support Durbin’s Call for ‘Crackdown’ on Hidden Credit Card Swipe Fees
MPC backed Senator Dick Durbin’s new call for action on rising credit card swipe fees, which he said are hidden from consumers who ultimately pay higher prices because of them.
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Merchants Welcome Trump’s Continued Backing of Credit Card Swipe Fee Legislation
MPC thanked President Donald Trump for reiterating his support for the Credit Card Competition Act.
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CNN via WUSA-TV: Hidden fees in your credit card could cost you $1200 per year
Credit card companies make billions of dollars a year charging these fees. Last year, U.S. businesses paid nearly $200 billion in credit and debit card fees. And merchants are often forces to pass that cost on to consumers, according to the Merchants Payments Coalition.
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Harrisburg Patriot-News: Visa, Mastercard make bank on swipe fees, report claims
Both Visa and Mastercard have recently reported huge earnings -- something the Merchants Payments Coalition (MPC) is attributing to skyrocketing swipe fees.
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Visa and Mastercard Follow Megabanks in Reporting Huge Profits Fueled by Soaring Credit Card Swipe Fees
The nation’s two largest credit card networks reported mammoth profits this week even as many small businesses and consumers continue to struggle with affordability, MPC said.
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MPC Hill Blast: Can Credit Card Companies Have Egg on Their Faces?
There is evidence of price-fixing pushing up egg prices, according to the Wall Street Journal. ...What does this have to do with credit cards? Well, credit card companies don’t need to manipulate anything — they just centrally price-fix swipe fees on behalf of all the banks that issue their cards.
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Scranton Times-Tribune: Rising swipe fees impacting back-to-school prices
The Merchants Payments Coalition estimates swipe fees for K-12 school supplies will account for about $20 of the per-family cost and $1.02 billion of the total while the fees will equate to $34 on average and $2.4 billion overall for back-to-college spending.
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Forbes: Why The Credit Card Industry Is Spending $200 Million To Oppose This Legislation—While Big Box Retailers Support It
Right now, banks and merchants have to use whatever networks are tied to the card—which means they have pretty free rein to set whatever swipe fee rate they want. Those rates are typically between two and three percent, and the Merchants Payments Coalition, which advocates for the CCCA, reports the average rate has gone up from 2.02% in 2010 to 2.36% in 2026. Since the fees are a percentage of the transaction’s overall cost, that also means the fees get higher as inflation rises and prices of goods go up.
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Harrisburg Patriot-News: Swipe fees driving up school supply costs: ‘Undermines affordability’
A new report from advocacy group The Merchants Payment Coalition (MPC) has thrown this issue into high relief by claiming how swipe fees are expected to drive up the price of school and college supplies by about $3.4 billion this year. According to the report, swipe fees are, on average, about 2.36 percent of a transaction (although they can be as much as four percent). This makes them a retailers’ highest operating cost after labor and, like labor, swipe fees “have to be built into pricing.” “Swipe fees account for $2 of the $85 price of a typical school-recommended list of pencils, crayons, paper and similar supplies for a first-grader,” the report reads. “In high school, the fees can total $3.30 on a $140 graphing calculator required for an algebra class and $3.19 for a basic supply list. They amount to $15.34 on a $650 laptop.”
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