A DENT IN DEBIT FEES
Do you accept debit cards as a form of payment, and offer a device to customers so that they can input their PIN 
codes? When you signed a contract with your credit card processing company or bank, this undoubtedly included a per-swipe fee for this type of debit card use. The national average for this charge, according to a recent Associated Press article, is a whopping 44¢ per transaction.
There is good news on the horizon, however, with a new regulatory law taking effect on October 1 that will set a cap of 21¢ per card swipe. The new Federal Reserve regulation will, however, also increase the amount that credit card processors can charge for covering fraud prevention.
A 2009 Nilson Report showed that merchants paid a grand total of $19.7 billion in debit transaction fees. No matter how small your portion is of this huge amount, it is nevertheless worth investigating whether this new regulation will help you lower the percentage that you are being charged.
The Associated Press story states that banks and credit unions with assets of under $10 billion are except from the rule, on the premise that they rely more on swipe fees. This means that you may need to select a network that charges a lower fee, even if it means going to a processing company outside your local area.
Bank fees are a large percentage of the costs of running almost any type of business today. Any change in the amount of these fees can have a significant impact on your bottom line. In light of this new regulation, this would be a good time to examine your credit card processing contract to see if you put a dent in your "per swipe" fee on debit card transactions.
Boog commented:
It's imperative that more ppolee make this exact point.
Tessica commented:
This has made my day. I wish all postgins were this good.
gstanski commented:
The latest version of the Fed’s final debit interchange rule has not changed much. It is still good news for retailers and bad one for issuers. It is also still bad news for consumers who are already feeling the rule’s side effects, even before it has taken effect. Anticipating lower revenues, banks have begun creating new or expanding existing revenue sources. As a result, free checking accounts are going away, new bank fees are being introduced and old ones increased, interest rates are being hiked, rewards are being slashed, etc.
So the damage to consumers is already done and it will not be reversed, even if the Fed eventually decided not to change the interchange status quo after all. What we have here is a government-mandated redistribution of revenues from one industry to another, something it has no business doing. blog.unibulmerchantservices.com/debit-card-fee-limit-lifted-to-24-cents-consumers-will-still-pay-for-it
JOHN KEVRANIAN commented:
AT THE END THE CONSUMER AND THE MERCHANTS WILL PAY HIGHER PRICES. THANKS TO THE BANKS AND CONGRESS .
Todd Thomson commented:
Carol, I think it important to note that this legislation caps the debit Interchange fee specifically, which is the amount paid to the card issuer for each transaction, it does not however, mean that the merchant is only going to pay 21¢ for each transaction. As you noted, there are fraud related recoups of 5 basis points (.05%) of the transaction amount, and an additional 1¢ per transaction for fraud prevention, but in addition to that the legislation DOES NOT regulate surcharges or assessments, which are the fees charged by and paid to other entities involved in processing a given transaction. Obviously merchant account holders should benefit from this, but I believe many have misconceptions about just how much money they're going to save in all of this, especially SMBs.
