Since the Federal Budget was brought down in May, the year has felt like a long, slow wait for a return to certainty.

By the end of next week, one major change will be law. From 1 October 2026, businesses will not be able to apply a goods surcharge when customers pay by eftpos, Mastercard, Visa or American Express (as well as UnionPay and JCB).

But how certain are these changes and how well are the exemptions understood?

Card types covered by the surcharge ban include credit, debit and prepaid cards, whether they are domestic or international. The ban will apply to purchases made in-store and online checkout environments across Australia.

However, it will not be the complete end of the extra fee merchants can charge you for tapping or inserting your card at the checkout or website.

In the first few weeks of October, the card networks and payment providers who enforce the system may experience delays with implementing the ban with the estimated 15% of small merchants who currently surcharge.

Beyond those technical issues, generally the ban does not apply to other electronic payment methods, such as BNPL (buy now pay later), paypal and taxi fares.

Businesses can also continue to surcharge across all payment methods as long as the surcharge does not exceed what it costs the business to use that payment type. If a business surcharges its customers, it must be able to prove the costs it is based on.

For example, businesses can apply a weekend or a public holiday surcharge as long as they clearly display the additional fee to the public, such as: “A 10% public holiday surcharge applies today” and the surcharge is transparently visible on the eftpos payment receipt or tax invoice.

It is fairly apparent that any business that operates outside Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm hours, and as a consequence, pays their staff additional wages by virtue of the industrial awards under which they are employed, can pass on those employment costs to their customers through a card surcharge.

Businesses are also permitted to offer discounts for cash payments, which is hardly consistent with other recent legislation to combat the black economy, such as the Anti Money Laundering (AML) regulations imposed on real estate agents, lawyers and accountants since 1 July.

If your business currently applies card surcharges, you may need to update your payment systems, pricing and customer information before the change begins.

To prepare your business for the change, now is the time to:

• Check where you apply card surcharges: Review your EFTPOS terminals, point-of-sale systems, invoicing software, online payment platforms and other payment systems.
• Understand your card payment costs: Review your transaction volumes, merchant fees and other payment-related costs.
• Contact your merchant service provider: Ask what changes you need to make and when you need to make them. You may also wish to compare services and fees from other providers.
• Review your pricing: Review your pricing and business costs to understand the impact of the changes.
• Update and test your systems: Make the required changes and test them on 1 October.
• Prepare your staff: Make sure they understand the changes and can explain them clearly to customers.

To communicate the change with customers, before 1 October 2026:

• Remove card surcharge information from menus, websites, booking systems, invoices and other customer-facing materials.
• Update displayed prices where necessary.
• Train staff so they can answer customer questions.
• Check that information is consistent across your physical and online channels.

If you change the price of a product or service, do not mislead customers about the reason for the increase.

More information and resources

• Read the ACCC’s guidance on displaying prices clearly. 
• Read the RBA’s removal of payment surcharge FAQs.
• Download the card surcharge changes factsheet 
• View the frequently asked questions
• Download the communications kit and assets