Here comes Durbin again

If it hasn’t already happened, small merchants are about to get a rude awakening if they currently accept PIN debit transactions. Because of certain provisions in the durbin amendment which regulated debit card interchange, debit networks are now individually allowed to charge annual fees for facilitating debit transactions on their networks. This means if you accepted a PIN debit transaction through Pulse, Star, or many of the other debit networks, or if you’re even set up to accept these transactions, you will most likely be seeing annual fees from $5+ per debit network appearing on an upcoming statement. There are 13 debit networks currently, but not all merchants are likely setup on all networks.

While this isn’t an extraordinarily large fee, many merchants only accept a few PIN debit transactions per month or even per year. PIN debit network fees are going to be a major headache for small merchants who may not even know they are setup to accept them. This is one of those unintended consequences of the debit regulation, which has no effect on the super corporations that lobbied so hard for it, but may have a much larger effect on small merchants.