Unwrapping Card Fees This Holiday Season

This year is poised to be an expensive holiday season for retailers, who have battled breakneck fee increases over the past three years. Between rising fees, continued growth in the online segment, and a spike in credit card usage, digital retailers could be hardest hit.

How Have U.S. Card Fees Grown Since 2006?

U.S. merchants face some of the highest credit card swipe fees globally. On November 19, 2024, the Senate Judiciary Committee revisits this issue in a hearing titled “Breaking the Visa-Mastercard Duopoly: Bringing Competition and Lower Fees to the Credit Card System.”

How Much Interchange was Paid on Sales Tax in the U.S.?

CMSPI estimates that U.S. merchants paid nearly $10 billion in interchange on sales tax, gasoline and diesel excise taxes, and alcohol excise taxes. Read below to see how the impact differed by state.

CMSPI Insights Advisory Council Launches Inaugural State of the Industry Report

Today, CMSPI released a State of the Industry Report in collaboration with the client-led Insights Advisory Council (IAC) formed in 2023.

State of the Industry Report

CMSPI is proud to launch its first annual State of the Industry Report (SOIR), produced in partnership with CMSPI’s Insights Advisory Council (IAC). Access the SOIR eBooks and download the full report here.

Payments Regulation in Asia

In collaboration with Amazon, CMSPI is pleased to present this paper on payments trends and regulations across four of the largest retail payments markets in the Asia Pacific region. Across Japan, India, Singapore, and Australia, merchant payments fees are rising or are cited as an issue due to the high costs of acceptance. Within each market, regulators have taken various approaches to the issue of rising card fees, and this report examines merchant-focused regulatory interventions in two ways: competition and controls within the card market and competition with the card market through investment in local competitor payment methods.

Fraud Wars: How Tech, Shifting Attitudes, and Organized Crime Are Redefining Online Retail Security

In the high-stakes world of online retail, three forces are shaking up the fight against fraud: cutting-edge technology, changing attitudes towards what feels like fraud, and increasingly cunning organized crime. Are merchants ready to tackle these evolving threats? Dive into our latest blog to uncover how these elements are transforming ecommerce security and what retailers need to do to stay ahead.

Australia Payment Cost Trends

Shifting payments mix, rising ecommerce spending, and fee increases are shaping the Australian payments market. While regulation has introduced new competition for merchants, fees continue to rise. For example, CMSPI estimates that just three recent fee increases alone are estimated to cost Australian retailers over $40 million annually.

Five Common Mistakes When Evaluating the PINless Debit Business Case

Payments teams love flexibility almost more than they love incremental savings. While PINless debit can offer both flexibility and savings, when talking PINless debit, however, many merchants claim that they don’t see a large enough opportunity to invest in the solution. Unfortunately, many merchants may not be evaluating PINless granularly enough to properly evaluate the potential savings.

Boosting Transaction Approval Rates: A Guide to The Tools on The Market

In their 2024 report, the Merchant Risk Council found that ‘revenue’ was the most highly ranked payments KPI among merchants. Here, we break down five industry innovations intended to maximize the success of good transactions.

The Complexity of Payments: A Driver of Costs or An Opportunity for Savings?

As complexity mounts, many merchants find themselves grappling to control their expenses, leading to unnoticed elevated fees. However, some merchants are ushering in a new era of payments optimization where embracing complexity drives savings, rather than cost increases.

A Guide to Competition in the U.S. Payments Market

Does network routing competition create market efficiencies? In this article, we discuss competitive interventions within the U.S. payments landscape. We compare norms pre- and postintervention and highlight key hurdles faced by merchants in extracting the value of regulation. Finally, we map out the road ahead in terms of new challenges and potential avenues for improving the payments landscape.