Credit Card surcharges
 

What is your take on surcharges and convenience fees applied to credit card sales in Florida? Just paid one today, and noted that Sumter County applies surcharge to tax bills paid by credit card. If I read the info linked, it appears illegal. Statutes & Constitution
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Online Sunshine.

According to the statute, it is illegal, even for the state and county. But, I think some courts have ruled that it is legal. Some businesses are charging a surcharge to use a credit or debit card. One of them is the Arnold Palmer Country Club restaurant.

Sumter County uses a third party to process credit card payments, credit card machines are provided by that vendor, the fee is 2.5% use of a bank debit card is $2.50…

Is it legal to charge a credit card surcharge in Florida?

Florida has a law prohibiting credit card surcharges, but that law was held unconstitutional by federal courts. Therefore, merchants in Florida may add a surcharge to credit card purchases.

§ 501.0117 Declared Unconstitutional

The United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit reversed the district court ruling and found that Florida's no-surcharge statute regulated speech and violated businesses' commercial speech rights, and thus was unconstitutional.

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As long as it's disclosed, I have no problem with it and I don't think it's illegal. However, I can't remember the last time I paid a fee, as there are usually alternative payment options that don't carry any additional fees. One being, an electronic check from a bank account, which Sumter does accept for tax bill payments.

It cost the merchant money to process the cc. Thus if no fee is charged this cost is spread over all customers. If the charge can be limited to just the customer causing the expense then the non cc customers should get a lower price in theory. In short if you pay a dollar on a cc the merchant might only get 95 to 97 cents but if you use a dollar bill they get 100 cents.

That is technically accurate. But, if merchants stopped accepting credit cards, they would lose a lot of business. When McDonald's started accepting credit cards, they noticed a 50 percent increase in their average transaction amount. It is human nature for people to spend more money when they use a credit card than when they pay cash. I think that McDonald's doesn't charge a credit card surcharge for a good reason.

cost of charge
 

Yes, even a medical practice I see is charging a fee for card use. Not being a tax accountant, I wonder wouldn't the costs of having a credit billing service be deductible as a business expense?

Yes, all costs associated with operating a business are deductible from their gross income.

My understanding was that usually the credit card companies (Mastercard, visa, etc) prohibit a surcharge if a business is to accept the cards. They don’t want to lose revenue. But some businesses will offer a cash discount as a way around this.

LOL. Isn't that the same thing as charging a surcharge? Semantics.

Have you ever wondered why you see more companies going to Credit/Debit Card only payments. Turns out that it is more cost effective in the big picture. The company does not have to worry about keeping cash/change, employee theft, counting and balancing cash throughout the day, etc. Using only charge cards generates immediately your proceeds and almost automatically deposits them into the bank each day. All labor needed to take cash are significant cost and problems for the company but is assumed to be normal. Unfortunately, some companies still live in the past and insist they are losing all the money paid to fees. they need to look at the bigger picture! (including usually an increase in sales!)

False.

That was the case many years ago until a class action lawsuit and gooberment* intervention brought about an industry-wide change. The current law allows but does not require merchants to charge customers up to the amount of their processing fees (generally between 2-3%) to use a card.

You can choose not to pay the fee by using another form of payment or patronizing a business that does not impose the fee. Vote with your wallet and your feet.

There is no reason V/MC/Discover need to charge such high fees anymore, but that is another whole topic.

*I borrowed/stole that classic term from another poster here (forget who) so I am offing a HT on a one time basis. Thank you.

Huh??? Violated free speech rights?? If I was really interested and not too lazy I would do a deep dive into this further. Sounds hokey. Just saying.