The RBA's Card Interchange Standards govern fee benchmarks and business requirements for designated Australian card systems. The 2026 reforms distinguish consumer credit, commercial credit, debit and foreign-issued cards; the category and implementation date determine the limits.
TL;DR:
- Caps vary across designated debit, prepaid, consumer-credit and other card categories.
- 2026 reforms have separate implementation arrangements and commencement dates.
- Interchange caps do not cover the merchant's separate scheme and acquiring charges.
Summary
Interchange within merchant payment costs
Interchange is the payment between participants in a card arrangement, commonly flowing from the acquiring side to the issuer. The RBA regulates specified interchange arrangements in designated card systems to address efficiency and competition concerns. A merchant’s overall service fee can also contain scheme and acquiring costs, so a change to interchange does not mechanically produce the same change in every merchant’s bill. The standards concern particular systems and categories rather than setting one universal retail acceptance price.
The categories in the 2026 decisions
The RBA’s March 2026 conclusions distinguish domestic-issued debit and prepaid cards, consumer credit cards, commercial credit cards and foreign-issued cards. They retain an eight-cent domestic debit benchmark while lowering its cap, reduce the domestic consumer-credit cap, retain a higher commercial-credit cap and introduce a cap for foreign-issued transactions. The distinctions reflect different market conditions and fee structures. A percentage figure should therefore always remain attached to the card category and the relevant standard.
Net compensation and the regulated perimeter
The reforms also address net compensation to issuers, including the treatment of Australian issuers with sponsors domiciled elsewhere. This is designed to make the regulatory treatment depend on the relevant issuer and arrangement rather than only the location of a sponsoring entity. The wider framework includes designations, standards, access regimes and related guidance. Which obligations apply depends on the system and participant role as well as the transaction’s card classification.
Implementation dates and the actual merchant offer
The RBA’s current regulations page records changes to Standards 1, 2 and 3 from 1 October 2026 and links the reform package. Individual provisions and transaction categories can have their own implementation arrangements, so the current instrument should be checked before assigning a cap to a payment. For commercial analysis, the useful comparison is the relevant interchange rule alongside scheme charges, routing and the acquirer’s actual pricing, with the same card and transaction scope used throughout.
Keywords
- Australian interchange
- RBA standards
- debit cards
- consumer credit
- commercial cards
- foreign issuers
- fee caps
- issuer compensation
- scheme charges
- 2026 reforms