Australia Cuts Card Fees as Wells Fargo Expands Cross-Border Payments

The Reserve Bank of Australia began reviewing merchants’ card-payment costs in October 2024. As cash use declined and merchants increasingly applied the same surcharge to all card types, the existing system no longer steered consumers toward lower-cost payment methods. The reforms cover eftpos, Visa and Mastercard and underscore a global regulatory push for major card networks to lower merchant costs.

The RBA finalized the reforms in March 2026, banning surcharges on debit, prepaid and credit cards from October 1. The interchange-fee cap for domestic consumer credit cards will fall to 0.3%, while the debit-card cap will drop to 8 Australian cents per transaction or 0.16%. A 1.0% cap for foreign-issued cards will take effect on April 1, 2027. The changes are estimated to save merchants A$910 million annually. Meanwhile, Wells Fargo is advancing a multi-rail cross-border payments strategy integrating real-time payments, wire transfers and Global ACH.