Buried in the RBA's card payments overhaul is a requirement for standardised fee information on merchant statements, a change aimed at making the true cost of card acceptance easier to read.

It is the end of the month in a small business somewhere in Australia. The owner has closed the till, paid the suppliers and is now looking at a statement from the payment provider. There are line items for transactions, a figure for fees, perhaps a terminal rental charge, and a set of abbreviations that may or may not mean anything to someone whose expertise is baking bread, fixing cars or running a physiotherapy clinic.

That scene, repeated in businesses across the country, is the problem one of the Reserve Bank of Australia's less publicised reforms is trying to solve. As part of the conclusions of its Review of Merchant Card Payment Costs and Surcharging, the RBA has required standardised fee information on merchant statements.

It is not the reform that will make the evening news. That honour goes to the end of card surcharges on Thursday 1 October 2026. But for business owners trying to understand and control their costs, it may prove one of the more practical changes in the package.

Why statements have been hard to read

Accepting card payments involves a chain of parties. The customer's bank issues the card. The card network, such as eftpos, Mastercard or Visa, runs the scheme. The merchant's acquirer, the bank or payment provider that handles the business's side of the transaction, processes the payment and charges a fee for doing so.

That merchant service fee typically reflects several underlying costs: interchange paid to the card issuer, scheme fees paid to the network, and the acquirer's own margin. On top of that, some providers charge for terminal hire, monthly minimums, chargebacks or other services.

Different providers have historically presented this information in different ways. Some show a single blended rate. Some break costs down by card type. Some use their own terminology. The result, for many small businesses, has been statements that are difficult to interpret and almost impossible to compare side by side with a competitor's offer.

What the RBA has changed

The RBA's reforms include three related transparency measures:

  • merchant statements are to include standardised fee information;
  • large acquirers must publish the fees they charge;
  • eftpos, Mastercard and Visa must disclose fee information.

The standardised statement is the piece that lands directly in the business owner's inbox or mailbox. The idea behind standardisation is simple: if every provider presents core fee information on a consistent basis, a business can read its own statement more easily, and can compare what it is paying with published fees and with other providers' offers.

The precise format and required content are set out in the RBA's conclusions material and related standards. This article does not attempt to reproduce those technical details, and businesses wanting the specifics may find the RBA's published FAQs a useful starting point.

Why it matters more now

Three other parts of the RBA package make clearer statements more valuable.

First, surcharging ends. From 1 October, surcharges on eftpos, Mastercard, Visa and American Express payments end, covering credit, debit and prepaid cards. About 16% of Australian businesses currently surcharge, and the RBA notes these businesses may choose to raise their sticker prices. Either way, the cost of accepting cards can no longer be passed directly to card-paying customers as a separate fee. Understanding that cost becomes more important when it has to be absorbed or built into prices.

Second, interchange has come down. The review lowered maximum interchange fees for consumer credit and debit card payments and introduced a new cap for foreign, or overseas-issued, card transactions. The RBA says these reductions "should help to lower card payment costs for businesses, especially small businesses". A standardised statement is one way for a business to check whether it is seeing the benefit.

Third, competition. Published acquirer fees give businesses a benchmark. A statement that uses consistent terms makes it easier to hold one's own costs up against that benchmark and to ask informed questions of a provider.

There is also an element of timing. Amended RBA standards took effect in April 2026, so businesses have had some months under the new framework before the surcharge ban takes hold.

The reform also fits within the RBA's wider payments agenda. In June 2026 the Payments System Board launched a consultation on wider payments system regulation, covering competition, efficiency and safety. The review itself drew over 260 written submissions and about 150 industry meetings.

Reading a statement: questions to consider

Standardised information is only useful if it is read. Some questions a business owner might bring to their next statement:

  • What was the total cost of accepting cards this period, including all fees and charges?
  • What does that represent as a share of card sales, the business's effective rate?
  • Is the business on a blended rate, or are costs shown by card type?
  • Are there fixed charges, such as terminal rental or monthly minimums, that weigh heavily on a low-volume month?
  • How does the effective rate compare with fees large acquirers now publish?
  • Has anything changed since the amended standards took effect in April?

None of these questions has a single right answer, and the best arrangement will differ between a high-volume supermarket and a small market stall. The point of standardisation is to make the questions easier to answer.

Businesses should also keep in mind what remains allowed after 1 October. Weekend surcharges, public holiday surcharges and booking or service fees are still permitted, and businesses can offer discounts for particular payment methods. Taxi surcharging remains a matter for state and territory regulators.

The bottom line

Standardised fee information on merchant statements is unlikely to be noticed by shoppers, but it may be one of the more useful changes for small business owners. Arriving alongside the end of card surcharges, lower interchange caps and published acquirer fees, it is designed to turn a hard-to-read document into a practical tool. What businesses do with that information will vary, but the RBA's aim is for the cost of accepting cards to be something owners can see, understand and compare.