Can an online store still add a card surcharge?

What changed

The decision is the Reserve Bank's. The Reserve Bank's Payments System Board has decided that it would be in the public interest to remove surcharging by lifting the prohibition on no-surcharge rules for all designated card networks (debit, prepaid, credit). It assessed that removing surcharging by lifting the prohibition on no-surcharge rules for all designated card networks would best promote the public interest, more strongly than removing surcharging on debit cards only.

The ACCC gives the effect for a store that takes cards: these changes allowed the Visa, Mastercard and eftpos card networks to introduce no surcharge rules from 1 October 2026 for businesses that accept payments made with prepaid, debit and credit cards from each network. These card networks decided to introduce these no surcharge rules from 1 October 2026, and this means businesses cannot charge customers a surcharge for these payment types.

Which cards

The ACCC draws the card boundary twice. First, these changes only apply to card payment surcharges for Visa, Mastercard, American Express and eftpos payments. Second, on the networks whose rules changed: although American Express is not regulated by the Reserve Bank of Australia in the same way, it also decided to remove surcharging from 1 October 2026. The Board's decision itself covers all designated card networks, across debit, prepaid and credit cards, and the networks the Conclusions Paper names as currently designated are eftpos, Mastercard and Visa.

The ACCC also tells a store where to check its own position: businesses should check the relevant card network rules or contact their payment service provider for information about the no surcharge rules.

What stays lawful

Other fees. The ACCC says the changes do not stop businesses from charging other fees or surcharges that are unrelated to paying by card. But there are existing rules under the Australian Consumer Law that businesses need to follow for how prices should be displayed when businesses charge these types of fees, including displaying the minimum total cost of a product or service as a single figure. That figure must include any fee that can be calculated at the time the price is displayed, such as a flat percentage fee.

A renamed surcharge is still a surcharge. The ACCC's words: businesses shouldn't try to avoid the no surcharge rules set by the Visa, Mastercard, American Express and eftpos card networks by describing a card payment surcharge as another type of fee or charge, and businesses that do this may be engaging in misleading conduct.

The cost has to go somewhere else. Businesses still incur costs when accepting card payments despite the no surcharge rules, and the ACCC says those costs should be reflected in a business's overall pricing for the products or services it sells, rather than charged as a separate surcharge. Businesses can continue to recover the cost of accepting card payments by incorporating that cost into their overall pricing, and are generally free to set, raise and lower prices, though they must not mislead consumers about prices, including about the reasons for any price increases.

Discounts. The Reserve Bank's own summary keeps the other direction open: merchants retain the ability to offer a discount for their preferred payment method, which allows them to incentivise the use of payment methods that they consider to be cheaper to accept. Removing the RBA's prohibition on no-surcharge rules is not intended to prevent discounts being offered to consumers for using certain payment methods.

Dates, in order

The RBA's framework and the ACCC's account, in the order they happened:

1. 2003The RBA's surcharging framework was first introduced in 2003. It prohibits card networks from imposing no-surcharge rules, thereby allowing merchants to apply a surcharge to card transactions; before the framework, those card network rules generally prevented Australian merchants from applying a surcharge to card transactions.
2. 31 March 2026On 31 March 2026, the Reserve Bank of Australia announced changes to card payment surcharging rules in Australia.
3. 1 October 2026These changes allowed the Visa, Mastercard and eftpos card networks to introduce no surcharge rules for businesses that accept payments made with prepaid, debit and credit cards from each network, and American Express also decided to remove surcharging from this date. The ACCC's previous rules for excessive card payment surcharges also ended on 1 October 2026.

The ACCC's page is also where each card network's own rules are described, and it tells a business to check the relevant card network rules or contact its payment service provider for information about the no surcharge rules.

Showing a discount on a website

A store that wants to steer buyers towards a cheaper payment method has one lawful lever: the discount. The ACCC says businesses can offer discounts to consumers who pay using a particular payment method, such as cash or PayID. Payment method discounts should be clearly disclosed before consumers choose to book, order or pay. And the price of any item that is displayed to consumers must be the full price they will pay if they do not receive the payment method discount. Two things the ACCC says a business should not do: display only the discounted price, or make the discounted price more prominent than the full price.

For an online store, the Reserve Bank's view is that the checkout itself is part of the argument: when paying online, consumers may have more time to decide on a payment method and typically benefit from greater visibility of payment options, surcharges and discounts, and online merchants retain the options of providing discounts or designing the online checkout to encourage consumers to use lower cost payment methods.