Card Payment Surcharges Banned in Australia from 2026

[n7of9]

Where did you get that? I paid the amount including GST in cash. You assume she wont declare?

I dunno...I always assume a cashie is a cashie

 

[lovestotravel]

I dunno...I always assume a cashie is a cashie

Especially in bakeries with 2 cash registers

 

[Aussie_flyer]

I think I'm going to quit the QR code ordering systems with platform fees too, use the waiter to order or pay at the counter. I'm boycotting fees!

 

[Mr_Orange]

I think I'm going to quit the QR code ordering systems with platform fees too, use the waiter to order or pay at the counter. I'm boycotting fees!

I've been doing that for some time. I don't see why I should pay a fee when I do all the work of ordering and processing the payment.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

I've been doing that for some time. I don't see why I should pay a fee when I do all the work of ordering and processing the payment.

This is why I refuse to use self-scan checkouts - until Woolworths or Coles add me to their payroll.

 

[lovestotravel]

I think I'm going to quit the QR code ordering systems with platform fees too, use the waiter to order or pay at the counter. I'm boycotting fees!

I was going to use the QR code at a pub recently as me and U offers 1 Velocity Point per $5 spent.

But the fee was about 2%.

Went to the counter instead and ordered without that fee, also no CC fee and used a Restaurant gift card that I had that earns 10 QFF per $1.

I also like keeping staff in business taking orders

This is why I refuse to use self-scan checkouts - until Woolworths or Coles add me to their payroll.

If you buy shares, does that count ?

 

[esseeeayeenn]

I also like keeping staff in business taking orders

This is my real motive for refusing to use self-scan checkouts: keeping single mums and teenagers in jobs.

If you buy shares, does that count ?

No, that's me giving them my money. I want their money!

 

[albyd]

I still don't understand why paying in cash is 'cheaper' aside from fiddling the books to the ATO and your landlords (I understand major retail landlords charge rent based both on a base as well as turnover so that can't be accurately measured if the business pockets those sales and doesn't report them to Westfield (and conveniently to the ATO).

Yes, there isn't a direct cost to accept cash but there is a cost in banking it. unless you're fiddling the books again though the bank needs to see figures as high as possible to lend you more money ... my 2 cents worth. I am a customer so happy to be shown the other side of the coin.

 

[oz_mark]

I still don't understand why paying in cash is 'cheaper' aside from fiddling the books to the ATO and your landlords (I understand major retail landlords charge rent based both on a base as well as turnover so that can't be accurately measured if the business pockets those sales and doesn't report them to Westfield (and conveniently to the ATO).

Yes, there isn't a direct cost to accept cash but there is a cost in banking it. unless you're fiddling the books again though the bank needs to see figures as high as possible to lend you more money ... my 2 cents worth. I am a customer so happy to be shown the other side of the coin.

I think a lot comes down to 'observability' of the costs. Many costs associated with taking cash aren't directly observable. On the other hand, many of the costs associated with credit cards are observable.

I remember reading of a company that did the exercise of calculating the costs of cash vs credit cards, taking into account counting, handling, banking, etc. There wasn't much in it.

 

[Kangol]

Went to the counter instead and ordered without that fee, also no CC fee and used a Restaurant gift card that I had that earns 10 QFF per $1.

Which restaurant GC?

 

[lovestotravel]

Which restaurant GC?

20x Everyday Rewards points on TCN Gift, Teen, Baby, Restaurant, Pub & Bar, Event and Village gift cards at Woolworths - FreePoints

Expired 6 Oct 2026

freepoints.com.au

One benefit of no CC surcharges now is using these cards is easier as you just say $100 and $100 is on the EFTPOS machine, no calculating the amount that the cashier/bar person needs to enter to account for the CC surcharge to be added.

 

[Kangol]

20x Everyday Rewards points on TCN Gift, Teen, Baby, Restaurant, Pub & Bar, Event and Village gift cards at Woolworths - FreePoints

Expired 6 Oct 2026

freepoints.com.au

One benefit of no CC surcharges now is using these cards is easier as you just say $100 and $100 is on the EFTPOS machine, no calculating the amount that the cashier/bar person needs to enter to account for the CC surcharge to be added.

Thanks.
Do they act like an eftpos prepaid card, but blocked to certain merchant types?

 

[serfty]

Thanks.
Do they act like an eftpos prepaid card, but blocked to certain merchant types?

Yes, also you can.load them to apple wallet or Gpay.

More here ...

V

Post in thread 'Woolworths gift card thread'

Sep 21, 2026

From freepoints

20x Everyday Rewards points on Uber, Good Food, Rebel, BCF and Supercheap Auto gift cards at Woolworths - FreePoints

23 Sep to 29 Sep 2026

freepoints.com.au

Thanks. Here's the catalogue image:

TCN Good Food gift cards can be used at:

• 5812: Eating Places, Restaurants
• 5813: Bars, coughtail Lounges, Discotheques, Nightclubs, and Taverns: Drinking Places (Alcoholic Beverages)

Unofficially, TCN Good Food gift cards have been known to also support:

• 5811: Caterers
• 7011: Lodging: Hotels, Motels, Resorts: not elsewhere classified

You should always convert physical TCN Good Food gift cards into digital ones here...

• VantageXL

• 

 

[SeaWolf]

Good video from Jerome Laxale, the member for Bennelong on his view of the surcharge and interchange fee changes. He's been a long time advocate for reform in the digital payments space.

View this content on Instagram

View this content on Instagram

 

[JohnK]

Or they could stop taking credit cards if the costs are too high.
But then they may discover that the cost of accepting cash is not 0....

I struggle to understand why any business needs to have any form of surcharge.

Credit card surcharges is component pricing. No doubt at all.

Do you charge a customer for your rent costs? Electricity costs? Payroll?

Why are credit card surcharges any different? It's a cost of doing business. Include it as part of your final cost. If you can't then you shouldn't be in business.

I've seen a couple of interesting ones.

Thai buffet in Brisbane $20 for cash, $23 for card. That's too easy a choice.

Brisbane Seafood market 2% discount for cash, maximum $10.

 

[DC3]

I’ve got so used to never carrying cash. I don’t know if I could go back to doing that again.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

If discounts for cash become widespread and popular, there could be more unintended consequences.
A lot of self-scan checkouts don't take cash.
So there could be queues for those which do, and it could push people back to staffed checkouts.
This often means the express lanes, so they could become much slower as it generally takes longer to pay in cash.
Maybe supermarkets will be forced to put staff back on checkouts.
That would not be such a bad thing.

On the other hand longer waiting times at payment points would be annoying.
I just went through a drive through and I was waiting for ages.
I wondered why, then noticed the person in front of me was paying by cash.

 

[Saab34]

Why are credit card surcharges any different? It's a cost of doing business. Include it as part of your final cost. If you can't then you shouldn't be in business.

I think airlines started to bed in this practice a long while ago, it then spread like wildfire. It become stupid in the end, something like a $8 per passenger per sector fine for paying by card. I don’t know how airlines got away with that for so long, it became an important part of the whole revenue pie in the end so obviously walking it back was difficult for the finance managers.

Its just another expense on the P and L so just do what most retailers do and simply factor it into your pricing.

 

[transpactraveller]

It's just a form of drip pricing, hiding the full cost until the final stage of a purchase, and making it harder to compare to competitors prices (unless they all have the exact same add-on fees/charges).

Unfortunately it works on most people, they get lured in by the cheaper headline price, and the true cost is only revealed at the final stage of purchase, often when it's too inconvenient or uncomfortable to back out.

Sometimes they don't even realise they've paid the surcharge, or don't consider it was ever truely part of the purchase price. You see this with discussion around the ban. People quote the 'before ban' price excluding the surcharge that they paid on top of it.

 

[Zero]

If discounts for cash become widespread and popular, there could be more unintended consequences.
A lot of self-scan checkouts don't take cash.
So there could be queues for those which do, and it could push people back to staffed checkouts.
This often means the express lanes, so they could become much slower as it generally takes longer to pay in cash.
Maybe supermarkets will be forced to put staff back on checkouts.
That would not be such a bad thing.

On the other hand longer waiting times at payment points would be annoying.
I just went through a drive through and I was waiting for ages.
I wondered why, then noticed the person in front of me was paying by cash.

At the supermarkets and department stores (e.g. Kmart) that I go to, there is often a queue for the cash acceptors and also the staffed lanes, but this has been the case for a long time. It is mainly because during past renovations, they replaced many cash acceptors with card-only machines and reduced the staffed checkouts.

I have observed this across multiple branches and chains. These shops don't give cash discounts, nor did they have card surcharges. So people who are queuing for longer to use cash, are actively making this choice for their own reasons. A lower price is not one of those reasons. I have also observed that most people using staffed checkouts are paying by card.

With the end of surcharging, some people may start to carry cash if cash discounts become more prevalent than surcharges used to be. But these people are happy to pay by card if the price is the same (or less). I doubt these people will start choosing to pay cash at Coles.

Cash self-checkouts do allow you to dump coins and then pay the remainder by another method, but if there is a queue for cash acceptors but no wait for a card-only machine, people who only carry cash to take advantage of cash discounts are not going to wait.