This is an interesting article from WalletPop, a consumer finance website. Click here to read. It talks about the broader economic impacts of interchange fees. While we don’t think that reducing interchange will increase jobs as the article asserts, we do agree that Visa and MasterCard have unchecked pricing power. This pricing power manifests every year in the form of higher dues and interchange fees. While we don’t see any type of broad interchange reform through legislation anytime soon, there are still significant opportunities for merchants to reduce they credit/debit card processing costs. Companies can leverage industry best practices and use least cost routing for debit transactions, manage interchange for optimal rates, get competitive pricing from processing, and introduce alternative payment products. While these initiatives will not eliminate cost of processing non-cash payments, they WILL reduce the burden of swipe fees.
