Preparing your business for card surcharge changes from 1 October 2026

With more customers choosing to pay by card, payment costs are increasingly front of mind for both businesses and consumers. Changes to surcharging rules have been implemented to alter how these costs are recovered.

Now is a good time to understand your current cost of accepting card payments, check where surcharges are applied across your business, and consider whether your pricing or payment setup may need to change before 1 October 2026.

What's changing

From 1 October 2026, businesses will no longer be able to apply surcharges to designated debit, prepaid and credit card payments across eftpos, Mastercard, Visa and American Express networks.

The RBA also announced broader changes to card payment costs and transparency, including:

• Lower domestic interchange fee caps from 1 October 2026
• New interchange caps for foreign-issued cards from 1 April 2027
• Additional transparency requirements for payment providers, designed to help businesses better understand and compare payment costs

American Express has confirmed it supports the RBA's payment reforms and is working to remove surcharging from 1 October 2026. Until the changes take effect, existing surcharge rules continue to apply. 

Understanding your payment costs

To understand how these changes may affect your business, it’s helpful to first consider the costs involved in accepting card payments. 

Card payment costs are made up of several components, including interchange fees, card scheme fees and fees charged by payment service providers or acquirers.

Interchange fees are paid by the merchant’s bank to the cardholder’s bank when accepting card payments. Interchange fees form part of the merchant service fee, also known as the MSF, that your business pays to accept card payments.

These fees support parts of the card payments system, including transaction processing, fraud prevention, chargebacks, payment security and ongoing investment in payment infrastructure. 

Under the RBA’s reforms, domestic interchange fee caps will be lowered from 1 October 2026. The RBA has indicated these changes are intended to support businesses to access greater transparency and better value from payment services.

What this may mean for your business

From 1 October 2026, businesses will no longer be able to add a separate surcharge at checkout to designated debit, prepaid and credit card payments across eftpos, Mastercard, Visa and American Express networks.

Instead of being added separately at checkout, card acceptance costs will need to be considered as part of your overall pricing and cost management approach. 

Lower interchange caps may also reduce some payment costs, depending on your payment mix and the pricing plan of the payment acceptance products or services you are using. 

Businesses of all sizes may need to review how payment costs are managed. This is because surcharging can be configured across multiple payment channels and customer touchpoints, from EFTPOS terminals and point-of-sale systems to online checkouts, receipts and signage. For some businesses, this may also mean reviewing payment settings, customer-facing materials and staff processes ahead of the change. 

How your business can prepare

You can start planning for the change by understanding how your business accepts card payments today. There are three things you can do now:

1. Review your latest merchant statement to understand your cost of acceptance, including your merchant service fee, and explore least cost routing where available for eligible debit transactions
2. Check whether you apply surcharges today across your payment setup, including EFTPOS terminals, point-of-sale systems, online checkout or in-app payments
3. Speak to your providers if you use multiple third-party payment tools, so you understand how they plan to support the changes before 1 October 2026

What to review before 1 October 2026

Businesses should consider:

• Updating surcharge settings across eftpos, online and in-app payments
• Checking that prices shown to customers reflect the full transaction amount
• Reviewing any customer-facing signage, receipts, point-of-sale (POS) messaging, checkout screens and staff processes, if required
• Making sure staff understand the surcharge changes and can answer customer questions

What to review after 1 October 2026

After the changes take effect, it can also be useful to monitor how payment costs and customer behaviour evolve and adjust as needed. You may want to review whether:

• Customers are using different payment methods
• Your cost of accepting card payments has changed
• Your payment acceptance pricing plan remains appropriate for your business
• Lower-cost payment options are available

How CommBank can help

We understand the surcharging changes may raise questions about how your business manages payment costs.

If you accept card payments through CommBank, we’ll provide notice of any changes to surcharging settings on our products before the changes take effect.

If you also use a third-party point-of-sale, online checkout or app-based payment tools, you should speak with those providers about how they plan to support the changes.