Merchant and Customer Rights at Checkout

10-31-2011

Merchants Have Rights and Restrictions for Payment Card Acceptance

There has been a lot of confusion among consumers and merchants lately regarding acceptance of payment forms. Below are some Visa acceptance policies.

Merchants in the U.S. and its territories may steer customers to a particular brand or type of general purpose card or a particular form of payment.

U.S. merchants may engage in any of the following steering activities: 

• Offering a customer a discount or rebate, including an immediate discount or rebate at the point of sale;
• Offering a free or discounted product;
• Offering a free or discounted or enhanced service;
• Offering the customer an incentive, encouragement, or benefit;
• Expressing a preference for the use of a particular brand or type of general purpose card or a particular form of payment;
• Promoting a particular brand or type of general purpose card or a particular form or forms of payment;
• Communicating to a customer the reasonably estimated or actual costs incurred by the merchant when a customer uses a particular brand or type of general purpose card or a particular form of payment or the relative costs of using different brands or types of general purpose cards or different forms of payment; or
• Engaging in any other practices substantially equivalent to these.            

Also, a merchant must accept for payment any properly presented Visa card in its acceptance category.

Merchants may not surcharge Visa cards (a “Checkout” fee) or discriminate among Visa cards based on the issuer. They also may not set a minimum purchase amount for a debit card purchase. (U.S. merchants may require a minimum purchase amount on credit card transactions that does not exceed $10.)

Visa has a merchant complaint form if you are aware of any violations. Visa will contact the merchant to explain the operating rules.