Reiterating their point that the current system is helping big banks at the expense4 of small retailers, the National Retail Federation unveiled a print and radio ad campaign to urge people to urge lawmakers not to delay the Federal Reserve’s interchange rule.
“It’s your money that the big banks and credit card companies are swiping. And more than a billion dollars from American consumers every month,’’ the group says in an ad in Washington, D.C., area publications.
A radio ad aired in certain states targets key lawmakers on the subject. One being aired in Montana criticizes Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.), who has introduced legislation to delay the Fed rule’s implementation, for doing the bidding of big banks.
The credit union and bank trades already have teamed up on ads supporting the delay.
The Fed issued a draft rule in December and was supposed to issue a final rule next month but has been delayed in doing so because it is still going through the large number of comments it received on the proposal. The final rule is supposed to take effect in July.
Acording to the proposed rule, the allowable costs for interchange would be limited to no more than the issuer's allowable costs divided by the number of electronic debit transactions on which the issuer received or charged an interchange transaction fee in the calendar year. Or the issuer could receive debit interchange capped at 12 cents per transaction.
