The RBA surcharge ban is live. Since 1 October 2026, an Australian business cannot add a credit card surcharge, a debit card surcharge or any other fee for paying by card on Visa, Mastercard, eftpos or American Express. That includes a groom, a night's boarding or a pack of walks paid by card.
Where we stand. We make booking and payments software for pet businesses, and the Petboost booking fee mentioned below is ours. Everything about the ban itself comes from the Reserve Bank, the ACCC and the card networks, linked at the end.
The short version
A fee that exists because the customer paid by card is gone, whatever you call it. American Express, UnionPay and PayPal have dropped surcharging too, even though the RBA does not regulate them the way it regulates eftpos, Mastercard and Visa.
Fees that have nothing to do with how someone pays are still allowed. The RBA's own FAQ says the change does not apply to booking fees, service fees, or weekend and public holiday surcharges.
Your card costs have not gone anywhere. The RBA and the ACCC give the same answer about where they go now: into your prices. In Petboost that is one pass through Services, then Pricing Assistant, then Build Fees Into Pricing.
What the surcharge ban covers
The RBA did not ban surcharges itself. It removed its old prohibition on "no-surcharge" rules, and eftpos, Mastercard and Visa each brought in a no-surcharge rule from 1 October. The rule covers credit, debit and prepaid cards on those networks, including cards issued overseas (RBA FAQ).
American Express and UnionPay withdrew from their undertakings with the RBA on 1 October and removed surcharging on the same day. PayPal's no-surcharge rule started on 5 October 2026.
There is no small business exemption. A business is exempt only where a card network's own rules or a law gives it one.
An invoice sent in September does not get you round it either. The RBA's position is that if the card payment is made on or after 1 October, surcharging may no longer be available even though the invoice was issued earlier.
Who enforces it
Not the ACCC. The no-surcharge rules belong to the card networks and sit in their scheme rules and in your merchant agreement, so the networks and your payment provider enforce them (ACCC). The ACCC's old rules on excessive surcharges ended on 1 October.
The ACCC still has a job here. It enforces the Australian Consumer Law, which covers how you display prices and what you tell customers about why they changed.
In practice the first place most businesses meet the ban is their own terminal. The RBA says most large payment providers planned to switch surcharging off on the terminals they supply by 1 October.
What a pet business can still charge
The test is simple. Does the fee exist because the customer paid by card?
| Fee | Allowed since 1 October? |
|---|
| A line added because the customer paid by card ("card fee", "merchant fee", "processing fee") | No |
| Stripe's, Square's or your bank's processing fee passed on to the customer as its own line | No. Your provider still charges you; you cannot bill it to the customer separately |
| The same card-only line renamed "service fee" or "admin fee" | No. The ACCC says describing a card surcharge as another kind of fee may be misleading conduct |
| A booking fee or service fee that applies however the customer pays | Yes. The RBA FAQ names booking fees and service fees as outside the change |
| A weekend or public holiday surcharge | Yes |
| A discount for paying by cash or bank transfer | Yes, disclosed before the customer books |
Any fee you keep comes with a display rule. The ACCC requires the minimum total price to be shown as a single figure. That figure has to include any fee you can work out when the price is shown, such as a flat percentage. A fee that first appears at checkout is a price display problem even when it is not a surcharge.
The same goes for a payment method discount. The price you advertise has to be the full price a customer pays without the discount, and the discounted price cannot be the more prominent one.
Where the card cost goes now
Into the price. The ACCC's own worked example is a $60 haircut with a 1 per cent card surcharge, which becomes a $60.60 haircut with no surcharge. The arithmetic is the same for a groom or a daycare day.
One warning from the same guidance. If you also lift prices for other reasons, because wages or rent went up, do not tell customers the whole rise is down to the surcharge ban. The ACCC treats that as misleading.
For the bigger choice of absorbing card costs or moving prices, we walked through the numbers in absorb card fees or raise prices.
Three separate costs, kept separate
If you take payments through Petboost, three different costs come from two different companies. They are easier to price when you keep them apart:
Your Petboost subscription, the monthly plan.
The Petboost booking fee, a percentage on payments taken through the platform. It pays for the booking itself: scheduling, online booking, reminders, deposits and payment handling.
Stripe's card processing fee, which Stripe charges you for accepting the card. It is Stripe's fee, not ours.
Current Petboost rates are on the pricing page and Stripe's are in your Stripe dashboard. We do not type either into this guide: two companies set them, and a figure written here goes stale the first time one of them moves. Stripe's domestic card rate came down on 1 October as the RBA's lower interchange caps arrived; the detail is in Stripe's rate cut, and how it now compares to Square.
Doing it in Petboost
Go to Services, then Pricing Assistant, then Build Fees Into Pricing. It is part of Petboost payments. The wizard takes the card processing fee and the Petboost booking fee as two separate inputs rather than one blended number. It shows the before and after on every service, lets you set the rounding, and applies the lot in one go: configure, preview, review, apply.
Petboost no longer adds Stripe's processing fee to invoices at all. If you used to pass it on, that cost sits with you until it is in your prices, so the wizard is the first job if you have not run it yet.
Not sure whether you still surcharge somewhere? Look at a recent invoice and a terminal receipt. A line that only appears when the customer paid by card is the line that has to go.
The regulatory detail
The RBA made the change under its Standard No. 3 of 2016, removing the prohibition on no-surcharge rules for the designated card networks. In announcing it, the RBA said the surcharging framework was "no longer achieving its intended purpose of steering consumers towards making more efficient payment choices" (RBA media release).
The Board received many requests for carve-outs and turned them down. Its view in the Conclusions Paper was that exemptions would significantly raise complexity, and that simplicity and ease of enforcement outweigh the benefits.
Card fees between businesses are not exempt either, unless a network's rules say so. That matters if you invoice a vet clinic, a council or a rescue group for work.
What happens next
| Date | What happens |
|---|
| 1 October 2026 | No-surcharge rules start on eftpos, Mastercard and Visa. American Express and UnionPay drop surcharging. Lower interchange caps apply to domestic card transactions |
| 5 October 2026 | PayPal's no-surcharge rule starts |
| 30 October 2026 | Card networks and large acquirers (the banks and providers that process card payments for businesses) start publishing card payment fee information on their websites |
| 30 January 2027 | Large acquirers start publishing how interchange cuts have flowed through to merchant fees |
| 1 April 2027 | Interchange caps apply to cards issued overseas, and merchant statements must carry more detail |
Frequently Asked Questions
Is a credit card surcharge legal in Australia?
Not on Visa, Mastercard, eftpos or American Express since 1 October 2026. The card networks' no-surcharge rules apply to credit, debit and prepaid cards, and PayPal and UnionPay have dropped surcharging as well.
Can I still charge a booking fee?
Yes, if it is a genuine booking fee rather than a card fee in disguise. The RBA's FAQ says the change does not apply to booking fees or service fees. A fee that only appears when someone pays by card is a card surcharge, whatever it is called. Show any fee inside the total price you advertise.
Can I pass Stripe's fee on to customers?
No. Stripe still charges you its processing fee, but since 1 October you cannot bill it to the customer as a separate line. Build it into your prices instead; Petboost no longer adds it to invoices.
Can I offer a discount for cash?
Yes. Payment method discounts are allowed, as long as you disclose them before the customer books and the full price stays the advertised price.
Who do customers complain to?
The business first, then the card network or the business's payment provider. Misleading price displays can be reported to the ACCC or a state or territory consumer protection agency.
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