Democratic Sen. Richard Durbin is asking the Federal Reserve to probe allegedly anticompetitive practices that are forcing merchants to pay excessive debit-card fees levied during the coronavirus crisis by large networks like Visa Inc. MA Durbin said practices by the large card networks and debit-card issuers are diminishing competition in the online payments marketplace and costing merchants potentially billions of dollars. The letter, which Mr.

The amendment to the financial regulation reform bill approved today by the Senate will reduce competition and hurt consumers, MasterCard said. The Company continues to oppose the amendment approved in the U. Senate that is designed to increase profits for big box merchants at considerable expense to consumers, community banks, and credit unions. The amendment, which was offered by Senator Dick Durbin D-IL , attempts to regulate the operation of debit card networks by shifting costs from big box merchants to consumers. The Durbin amendment would give lobbyists for big retailers what they have been unable to achieve through other efforts the ability to maintain all the benefits they receive from debit card acceptance while transferring the cost to consumers. The Government Accountability Office, in a recent report on interchange fees, acknowledged that is what happened in Australia when the government there arbitrarily regulated these fees consumers ended up paying more for their payment cards, and there appears to be no evidence that merchants have passed on any savings to consumers as a result of artificially reduced interchange fees.

Dick Durbin, D-Ill. Durbin, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, made his remarks about a week after he and Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt.

Ever since it was a last minute addition to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of , the Durbin Amendment has been a controversial topic among lawmakers and businesses of all-sizes. With a new presidential administration in office promising to roll back any unnecessary regulations, the Durbin Amendment has once again stirred-up debate. That act permitted the Federal Reserve to put a cap on the interchange fees charged to merchants every time they swiped a debit card. The amendment was able to lower per transaction debit interchange fees with the hope that this would spur economic growth. Prior to the Durbin Amendment, banks were charging retailers 44 cents per transaction.