Financial Times – Mastercard will increase fees more than fivefold when a British shopper uses a debit or credit card to buy from an EU-based company, sparking alarm among companies that rely on online payments and concern among MPs over higher consumer prices. Mastercard and Visa levy an “interchange” fee on behalf of banks for every debit or credit card payment that uses their networks.
The EU introduced a cap in 2015 after concerns the hidden fees were leading to hundreds of millions of euros in costs for companies and higher prices for consumers. But Mastercard has told merchants that the cap no longer applies to some transactions post-Brexit, because payments between the UK and European Economic Area are now deemed “inter-regional”.
