To file a merchant surcharge disclosure, submit Visa’s online notification form and separately notify your payment processor at least 30 days before you begin adding the surcharge, then post the required disclosures at your entrance and register and itemize the surcharge on every receipt. Mastercard has suspended its own registration portal as of 2025 and is updating its rules, but you still have to give your acquirer 30 days’ notice for Mastercard transactions.1Mastercard. Mastercard Credit Card Surcharge Rules and Fees for Merchants
Information to Gather Before You File
Pull these details directly from your processor’s records rather than from memory. A misspelled legal name or wrong merchant ID can delay the filing or trigger a compliance review.
- Legal business name and DBA. Use the exact name on your merchant processing account, plus any “Doing Business As” name on your storefront or website.
- Merchant identification number (MID). Your acquirer assigns this. It appears on your processing statements.
- Surcharge percentage. The exact percentage you plan to charge, within the network caps described below.
- Business locations. The physical address of every location where you will apply the surcharge. Card networks track geographic compliance against state laws, so list only locations in states that allow surcharging.
- Contact information. Name, phone, and email for the person responsible for the surcharge program.
Caps You Cannot Exceed
The percentage you put on the form has to fit under the network ceiling and under your own cost of acceptance, whichever is lower.
- Visa: the lower of your merchant discount rate for the card being used, or 3%.2Visa. Merchant Surcharge Q and A
- Mastercard: the lower of your merchant discount rate, or 4%. If your Mastercard processing cost is 2.5%, your cap is 2.5%.3Mastercard. Merchant Surcharge FAQ
Most merchants’ processing costs fall well under 3%, so the merchant discount rate is usually the binding limit. If you want one flat surcharge percentage across all transactions, set it at or below your lowest applicable merchant discount rate so you stay compliant with both networks on every card.
How to Submit by Network
Visa
Visa requires merchants to submit a notification form online before implementing surcharges. The form is on Visa’s merchant surcharging page (visa.com/merchantsurcharging).4Visa. Surcharging Credit Cards – Q&A for Merchants After you submit, Visa sends an automated confirmation to the email you provided. Save it. That confirmation is your proof of compliance if a dispute or audit comes up later.
Visa’s rules also require you to notify your acquirer separately. The acquirer notification sits alongside the network filing, not in place of it.5Visa. Merchant Surcharging Considerations and Requirements Your acquirer has to enable the surcharge data field in transaction messages so the surcharge amount flows through to Visa correctly.
Mastercard
As of 2025, Mastercard has suspended its merchant surcharge registration requirement and is no longer requiring U.S. merchants to register through its online portal. The company has said it is updating its surcharging rules and anticipates announcing revised requirements.6Mastercard. Submit Merchant Surcharge Form You still have to notify your acquirer at least 30 days before you start surcharging Mastercard transactions. Contact your payment processor for the current procedure.
Discover and American Express
Discover and American Express have their own surcharge policies, and the requirements generally mirror Visa and Mastercard: 30 days’ advance notice and the same disclosure obligations. For American Express, your payment service provider handles the notification and enables surcharging on your merchant profile. Ask your processor about the exact submission process for each network you accept.
The 30-Day Waiting Period
After submitting your notification, wait at least 30 days before applying a surcharge to any customer transaction.4Visa. Surcharging Credit Cards – Q&A for Merchants Starting early can produce chargebacks, fines, or termination of your merchant account. The waiting period runs from the date of notification, not the date you decided to surcharge.
Use the 30 days to put the signage up, configure your terminal or e-commerce platform to add the surcharge as a separate line item, and train staff on how to answer customers who ask about the fee.
Signage at the Entrance and the Register
Card networks require surcharge disclosures at two specific points in a physical store: the point of entry and the point of sale.4Visa. Surcharging Credit Cards – Q&A for Merchants Visa provides sample language for both.
The entrance sign can be general: “We impose a surcharge on credit cards that is not greater than our cost of acceptance.” The register sign has to be more specific. It must state the exact percentage or dollar amount of the surcharge and note that debit cards are not surcharged.7Visa. Sample Surcharge Disclosure Signage There’s no required format. You can design your own signage as long as it carries the surcharge amount and the cost-of-acceptance language.
Online Checkout Disclosure
For online stores, the surcharge has to be clearly disclosed before the customer completes the transaction. The checkout page should show the surcharge as a distinct line item so the buyer sees the base price, the surcharge amount, and the total before clicking the final purchase button. Hiding the fee in fine print, or revealing it only on the confirmation page after the charge has run, violates both network rules and consumer protection standards.
Receipt Requirements
Every transaction receipt, paper or digital, has to show the surcharge as a separate line item with the dollar amount broken out from the purchase total.2Visa. Merchant Surcharge Q and A The receipt should show the subtotal, then the surcharge on its own line, then the total. Failing to itemize the surcharge is a common reason merchants get flagged in compliance reviews. Most modern point-of-sale systems can be configured to add a surcharge line automatically; check with your terminal provider or e-commerce platform for setup.
Where Surcharging Is Off the Table
Before you file anything, confirm that surcharging is legal where you operate. A disclosure form can’t rescue a surcharge that state law prohibits.
Connecticut bars any seller from imposing a surcharge on a buyer who chooses any payment method, including credit cards, and treats fees labeled “transaction fees” or “processing fees” the same as surcharges.8State of Connecticut. Credit Card Surcharge Massachusetts has an identical prohibition under its consumer credit laws.9General Court of Massachusetts. Massachusetts General Laws Part I, Title XX, Chapter 140D, Section 28A Maine prohibits surcharges on credit and debit card transactions for all sellers; only governmental entities collecting taxes or license fees may add one.10Maine State Legislature. Maine Code 9-A 8-509 – Credit Card and Debit Card Surcharge Prohibition Puerto Rico also prohibits surcharging.
New York produces the same practical outcome through a different route. Under General Business Law Section 518, merchants who surcharge must post the total credit-card-inclusive price as the displayed price and cannot break out a pre-surcharge subtotal or a separate surcharge line.11New York State Senate. New York Code GBS 518 – Credit Card Surcharge Notice Requirement Because network rules require showing the surcharge as a separate line item on the receipt, New York’s statute and the network rules conflict, and traditional surcharging doesn’t work there. Merchants in New York typically run a two-tier pricing model (a cash price and a higher credit card price) instead.
If you have locations in multiple states, your notification should list only the locations in states that permit surcharging. A cash discount, which lowers the price for cash payers rather than raising it for card users, is legal everywhere and requires no network notification.
Debit and Prepaid Cards Are Never Surcharged
Surcharging debit and prepaid card transactions is prohibited nationwide under federal law and card network rules, regardless of your state. This covers all debit transactions, PIN or signature. Visa’s sample signage puts it plainly: “We do not surcharge Visa debit cards.”7Visa. Sample Surcharge Disclosure Signage Your point-of-sale system has to distinguish credit from debit so the surcharge applies only to credit transactions. Accidentally surcharging a debit card is one of the fastest ways to draw a complaint.
Mistakes That Trigger Compliance Problems
Most surcharge violations are setup errors, not intent. The ones that come up most often:
- Surcharging debit cards because the terminal doesn’t distinguish credit from debit.
- Exceeding the cap. A flat 3% surcharge when your Visa merchant discount rate is 2.4% means you’re overcharging on Visa transactions. The cap is your actual cost or the network maximum, whichever is lower.
- Missing signage at either the entrance or the register. Both are required.
- Applying a surcharge at a location in a state that prohibits it.
- Filing with Visa but skipping the acquirer notification, leaving a gap in the compliance chain.
- Starting before the 30 days run. The clock begins at notification, not at your internal decision.
Card networks enforce these rules through the acquirer, and violations can escalate from warnings to fines to account termination. Customer complaints about undisclosed surcharges also tend to reach state attorneys general, who have independent authority to investigate deceptive pricing under consumer protection statutes.