Stand up for Main Street and urge your Senator to hold Visa and Mastercard accountable.

November 13, 2024

On November 19, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing to investigate Visa and Mastercard’s anticompetitive practices and excessive swipe fees. This is a crucial moment to shine a spotlight on how ever-increasing swipe fees are hurting American Main Street businesses and consumers alike, and why Congress needs to pass the Credit Card Competition Act (CCCA).

NACS members are encouraged to reach out to their members of Congress and ask that they support the Credit Card Competition Act. This is your chance to push for real change—more competition and a fair playing field for American businesses. Click here to ask Congress to #FightSwipeflation and hold Visa and Mastercard accountable for their harmful, anticompetitive practices.

The hearing on November 19 will be the first hearing on swipe fees since May 2022, just before the CCCA was first introduced and will be the 18th on swipe fees over the past 18 years.

“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. 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. This hearing will show lawmakers how anticompetitive practices and a broken market are causing these fees to constantly rise with negative impacts on their constituents. Once they’ve heard the facts, Congress needs to quickly pass this landmark pro-consumer legislation. American families and small business owners can’t afford to wait any longer.”

Swipe fees totaled a record $172 billion in 2023, according to the Nilson Report, with Visa and Mastercard’s swipe fees totaling more than $100 billion.

“Swipe fees are most merchants’ highest operating cost after labor and have more than doubled over the past decade. They are too high to absorb, especially for small merchants, and drive up consumer prices by an estimated $1,100 a year for the average family,” said the Merchant Payments Coalition, of which NACS is a founding member. “Payments consulting firm CMSPI estimates that the costs are even higher than the Nilson numbers, at $224 billion, with an impact of $1,700 a year.”

Visa and Mastercard, which control 80% of the market, each centrally set the swipe fees charged by banks that issue cards under their brands, and also block transactions from being processed over other networks that could do the job with lower fees and better security. The CCCA would require banks with at least $100 billion in assets to enable cards to be processed over at least two unaffiliated networks—Visa or Mastercard plus a competitor like NYCE, Star or Shazam.

Banks would choose which networks to enable, but merchants would then choose which to use, resulting in competition over fees, security and service expected to save merchants and consumers over $16 billion a year. Rewards would not be affected, security would be improved, consumers would still use the same cards, and community banks and all but one credit union would be exempt.

Click here to ask Congress to #FightSwipeflation and hold Visa and Mastercard accountable for their anticompetitive and harmful practices.