Only about 16% of Australian businesses added a card surcharge before 1 October, so for most shops the end of surcharging changed nothing at the counter.

For all the attention it has received, the end of card surcharging on 1 October 2026 was a non-event for most Australian businesses. They had never added a fee for paying by card in the first place.

That is not a guess. It comes from the Reserve Bank of Australia's (RBA) own research for its review of merchant card payment costs and surcharging. According to the RBA, around 16% of Australian businesses surcharged. Put the other way, roughly five in every six did not.

The breakdown by size is just as striking. The RBA found that 85% of small merchants and 89% of large merchants did not surcharge. Surcharging, in other words, was a minority practice among businesses of every size.

If so few businesses surcharged, why did the RBA act? The answer lies in the money involved and in what the RBA concluded about how surcharging was working.

Consumers paid an estimated $1.6 billion of the $1.8 billion in annual card surcharges, according to the RBA's conclusions paper. That is a significant sum, concentrated among the minority of businesses that applied the fees.

The RBA's verdict was that "surcharging no longer works as intended". It reached that view after a review that began in October 2024 and drew more than 260 written submissions and around 150 meetings.

From 1 October 2026, surcharges on eftpos, Mastercard and Visa debit and credit cards ended. American Express credit card surcharging also ended on the same day, although Amex is not formally regulated by the RBA.

What changes for the businesses that never surcharged

For the 84% or so of businesses that never added a card fee, the ban itself requires no change at the till. Their prices were already the prices card-paying customers paid.

Those businesses are still affected by the wider reform, though, through the cost of accepting cards. From 1 October, the RBA lowered or restructured several interchange caps:

  • Consumer credit cards: capped at 0.3%, with the weighted-average benchmark removed.
  • Commercial credit cards: unchanged at 0.8%, with the benchmark removed.
  • Debit and prepaid cards: 8 cents plus 0.16% per transaction, with the weighted-average benchmark staying at 8 cents.
  • Foreign-issued cards: a 1.0% cap from 1 April 2027.

The RBA estimates the changes will reduce card issuers' revenue by around $660 million a year, assuming no change in behaviour. It expects small merchants, most of which do not have strategic interchange rates, to gain the most.

That is a notable point for the many small businesses that never surcharged. They did not pass card costs on as a separate fee, and they now stand to benefit from lower interchange caps, depending on how much of the change reaches them through their merchant service fees.

What changes for the minority that did

For businesses that did surcharge, the change is more direct: the separate card fee has to go. The RBA's surcharging FAQs set out what remains allowed.

Businesses can build payment costs into their sticker prices. They can offer discounts, including for paying in cash. Weekend and public holiday surcharges, booking fees and service fees are not card surcharges, and terminal rental and processing fees paid by a merchant are not surcharges either.

Some details catch businesses that might assume they are outside the ban. Not-for-profits and business-to-business payments are not exempt by default. Card payments made on or after 1 October cannot be surcharged, even if the invoice was issued earlier. On exemptions in general, the FAQs are clear: "Whether any exemptions are available is a decision for each card network, not the RBA." Taxi surcharges are governed by state and territory law.

Will prices rise at former surcharging shops?

A natural concern is that businesses that lost their surcharge will simply lift prices to compensate. The RBA's assessment is that this should not alter what customers pay overall in a material way.

The RBA does not expect a material change in the total price paid at merchants that surcharged. Where a business folds the former surcharge into its sticker price, a card-paying customer is broadly paying the same total as before, just presented differently. The RBA describes the inflation impact of any rounding up as "negligible".

That assessment matters in the current environment. Headline inflation was 4.0% over the year to August 2026 on the monthly CPI indicator, and the trimmed mean measure of underlying inflation was 3.6% in the June quarter. Governor Michele Bullock has described underlying inflation as "about 3.5 per cent", above the 2.5% midpoint of the 2–3% target range. With so few businesses surcharging, and total prices at those that did expected to be broadly unchanged, the ban is not a significant inflation story.

The cost of making the switch

Implementation still has a price. The RBA estimates payment service providers will incur around $25 million in costs across the industry to put the changes in place.

There is also a transparency timetable ahead. Card networks must publish aggregate interchange and scheme fee data, and acquirers must publish merchant service fee data, with the first release due by 30 October 2026 covering 1 July to 30 September 2026. After that, the data is due within 30 days of the end of each quarter. Acquirers' first interchange pass-through measure is due by 30 January 2027, merchant statement changes by 1 April 2027, and Scheme Fee Roadmaps are expected by the same date.

For the majority of businesses that never surcharged, the pass-through data and redesigned statements may prove more useful than the ban itself. They are designed to make it easier to see what accepting cards actually costs and whether lower interchange is flowing through.

The bottom line

The surcharge ban is aimed at a practice that only a minority of businesses used. Around 16% of Australian businesses surcharged, and 85% of small and 89% of large merchants did not, so for most shops nothing changed at the counter on 1 October. The bigger effect for those businesses may come through lower interchange caps, which the RBA expects to benefit small merchants most. For the minority that did surcharge, the fee is gone, though other pricing options remain, and the RBA does not expect total prices at those businesses to change materially.