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Speaker 1: Now, the Aussies, as I was telling you yesterday, are

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Speaker 1: about to get rid of some of those annoying fees

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Speaker 1: that you get hit with when you pay by card,

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Speaker 1: and it looks like we might follow suit. The Ossie

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Speaker 1: government is planning to ban the sur charges for purchases

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Speaker 1: made by debit card. Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew

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Speaker 1: Bailey is with me right now.

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Speaker 2: Hey Andrew, how are you going?

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Speaker 1: I'm very well, thank you. So are you planning to

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Speaker 1: ban debit card surcharges?

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Speaker 2: Yes, we were working on I've been working with the

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Speaker 2: Commerce Commission for several months. In fact, we're a biggerhead

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Speaker 2: of Australians. We've just finished the comments Commissions just finished

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Speaker 2: consultation process and it's had a lot of submissions and

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Speaker 2: we expect to now make an announcement the next few weeks.

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Speaker 1: How what about the credit card surve charges?

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Speaker 2: Well, there's two things that the Commerce Commission went in

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Speaker 2: consult on. There's two parts that one is the end

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Speaker 2: bank fee charges and then the overall surve charge aspects

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Speaker 2: that when you go in and pay for your coffee,

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Speaker 2: you're incurring that total cost. So the focus has been

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Speaker 2: on both interbank charges and a surcharge the total fee,

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Speaker 2: because we want to make sure that you're not the

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Speaker 2: worst thing at the moment when you're go into a

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Speaker 2: shop to buy coffee, you don't know what is the surcharge.

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Speaker 2: So we want to deal with both debit cards and

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Speaker 2: credit cards.

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Speaker 1: Okay, so would you ban the seurcharge with credit cards

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Speaker 1: as well?

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Speaker 2: No, it's not a question of banning the total surcharge.

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Speaker 2: There isn't a legitimate fee to some extent, it's just

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Speaker 2: a question what is an appropriate feed at the moment? No? Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 2: at the moment, you know, you can be paying up

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Speaker 2: to two and a half percent and it's difficult for

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Speaker 2: the retailer as well. In many cases, the retailer doesn't

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Speaker 2: know what is an appropriate fee because it's made up

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Speaker 2: of a whole lot of components. But what we want

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Speaker 2: to make sure is that we have visibility around the

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Speaker 2: inter bank charge, which is the key of a counter

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Speaker 2: about sixty percent of the total costs that people pay,

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Speaker 2: and also making sure we've got to cap around the

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Speaker 2: total surcharge that people Where do.

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Speaker 1: You reckon that captured sit.

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Speaker 2: Well, we'll wait and see what the Commics Commission went

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Speaker 2: out with. They talked about an interact charge of one

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Speaker 2: point two percent and zero point seven percent for a

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Speaker 2: total shock. But that look, let's wait until the Commis

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Speaker 2: Commission finish its report. It's gonna it's going through that

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Speaker 2: process at the moment. But we are very committed to

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Speaker 2: make sure KIV is not paid more at the till

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Speaker 2: when they go to buy something and.

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Speaker 1: They brought to So if we if we are talking

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Speaker 1: about everything here right, we're talking about going down and

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Speaker 1: get your sushi, paying for your flights or your yeah

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Speaker 1: I don't know, yeah, yeah, travel agency fees. But also

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Speaker 1: if you go onto the New Zealand websites, what you're

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Speaker 1: paying there that little search charge on the credit card,

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Speaker 1: that would be capped as well.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, because what happened. If there's clarity around it, then

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Speaker 2: then the retailer or inners in and whatever can knock

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Speaker 2: at what their situation is and adjusted accordingly. So it's

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Speaker 2: it's we will keep like the end of bank charge,

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Speaker 2: that'll be something that Comms commissill be quite clear about.

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Speaker 2: But the total sur charge, there will be a clarity

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Speaker 2: around that and then the retail or whoever will be

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Speaker 2: in a position to be clear about what they should.

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Speaker 1: Be what's your time? From Andrew? When are you going

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Speaker 1: to do this?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Matter of next few weeks. Actually we were hoping

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Speaker 2: about to make an announcement before then, but the number

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Speaker 2: of submissions that the Comments Commissioner received they want to

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Speaker 2: take a bit more time to process.

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Speaker 1: I'm looking forward to it very very much, Andrew, thank

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Speaker 1: you very much, really appreciate is Andrew Bailey Commerce and

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Speaker 1: Consumer Affairs Minister. Oh those surcharges, they don't they grind gears.

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Speaker 1: I'll tell you two of my favorite ones. The New

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Speaker 1: Zealand surcharge. Oh angry every time, briefly angry. I've got

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Speaker 1: used to it. I just it's like a tiny little

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Speaker 1: flare up. I'm angry, and then you know what booking

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Speaker 1: you do? You resigned to it. The other one, the

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Speaker 1: old parking one. You know when they're like it's going

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Speaker 1: to cost you fifty cents to park your and fifty

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Speaker 1: cents to use your credit card or and then I'm

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Speaker 1: over it again. But anyway, he's going to fix it

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Speaker 1: for us. So that's that's fantastic. For more from Heather

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Speaker 1: Duplessy Allen Drive. Listen live to News Talks a B

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