Interchange Fees Forum

From: American Banker

From: BankCreditNews.com

The Credit Union National Association filed an amicus brief this week in a suit brought by merchant groups against the Federal Reserve’s final rule on debit interchange fees.

CUNA argued in the brief that large and small financial institutions are negatively impacted by the Federal Reserve’s interchange fee cap because the savings and benefits promised by merchants who pushed for the cap have yet to materialize, ATM Marketplace reports.

CUNA also said that the fees are so low that card issues cannot recoup costs or see a reasonable return on their investments. The organization says it plans to join a group of trade associations representing financial institutions.

From: Nation’s Restaurant News

The National Restaurant Association said it joined a lawsuit against the Federal Reserve, claiming that it failed to follow Congress’ intent regarding the amount that banks could charge retailers for accepting debit cards.

The lawsuit argues, among other things, that the Fed’s final rule on debit-card swipe or interchange fees set the rate at a higher level than Congress had intended when it passed the Durbin Amendment in 2010.

The legislation gave the Fed the power to regulate fees for debit cards and directed that it ensure they are “reasonable and proportional” to the cost of processing transactions.

From: AL.com

By Cliff Parmer

Understanding credit card processing is very complex and can be confusing to many business owners.

Therefore, we felt obligated to shed some light on the recently passed — and also very confusing — Durbin Amendment, which was passed by Congress in 2010 in attempt to cap the fees associated with accepting debit cards.

At first glance, Durbin looks like a valid solution to lowering merchants’ costs on accepting debit cards as a form of payment by their customers.

Here are a few examples of often-confused myths:

From: GoBankingRates.com

By Tim Chen

The unbanked are finally getting noticed: From Walmart and Target, to check cashing services and pawn shops, NetSpend and Green Dot to American Express, banks and non-banks alike are scrambling to attract these low-risk, highly lucrative potential customers. Even as rising checking account fees drive some out of the traditional banking system altogether, alternative financial services providers clamor for those that banks reject.

For banks, a perfect storm of low interest rates, cautious lending and regulatory changes rubbed most of the luster off of checking accounts. Usually, a bank can defray the cost of a checking account — estimated at more than $200 a year — by lending out the deposited funds and earning revenue off the interest spread.