Political Quotes

“I rise to speak about the effect of interchange fee reform on small banks and credit unions. Interchange fees are not well known by most Americans. They are known as swipe fees or interchange fees, and they reflect the amount of money that is paid to a bank each time you use that bank's credit or debit card. You do not know it as a consumer that you are being charged extra when you buy something in a store, but prices are higher because that fee is being paid to the bank every time you swipe the card. Who establishes that fee? You would assume the bank does, but it is not so. The fee that is charged every time you swipe a card is established by the credit card companies. The big giants Visa and MasterCard decide exactly how much that fee will be. And you ask yourself: Well then, what voice does a merchant or a retailer have in how much that fee is going to be on each transaction? And the answer is virtually no voice. It is a price-fixing mechanism where Visa and MasterCard, the major credit card companies, establish the interchange or swipe fee to be paid to each bank, credit union, or financial institution that issues the credit or debit card. It is a lot of money. Each month in America--just on debit cards now--each month in America, they collect about $1.3 billion in transactions where people use debit cards. Now, remember, a debit card is like your checking account.…”