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Overview

  • As the owner of the card program, you are responsible for any per transaction usage fees, which are based on the cardholder’s transactional activity or transaction volume (Gross Merchandise Value - GMV)
  • These fees will be passed through to you on the monthly invoice from Synctera
The main fee categories are:

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Issuer Cross Border Fees:

  • This is a specific category for a GMV-based fee for transactions where the country code of the merchant does not equal the country code of the card BIN (issuing country)
  • NOTE: The transaction can be initiated in USD, and the card can be in USD, but if the merchant themselves are in England, for example, the cross-border rules apply

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Activity Fees:

  • Activity-based fees, such as authorization fees, clearing fees, switch fees, stand-in frees, transaction tokenization fees, connectivity fees, chargeback fees, network access/brand usage fees, and investment fees
  • Some fees apply to both domestic and cross-border transactions, whereas some fees are specific to either domestic and cross-border transactions - for those, cross-border rates are generally higher than domestic rates

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Issuer Assessment Fees:

  • Also known as Quarterly Mastercard Reporting (QMR) fees
  • GMV-based fee - based on $-volumes reported to Mastercard for your program for the previous quarter
  • This increases the billing for the months of April, July, October and January, although the data example below shows the average BPS per month

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Fee Estimates

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Domestic Transactions

The below estimates are for a domestic POS purchase transaction:
  • In-store / Card Present vs. E-commerce / Card Not Present transactions
  • Fixed cost includes per transaction Activity Fees
  • Variable cost includes per GMV Activity Fees and Issuer Assessment Fees

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In-store / Card Present Transactions:

Transaction size$50$100$250$500$1,000$10,000
Average fixed cost$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.0954
Average variable cost$0.0450$0.0900$0.2250$0.4500$0.9000$9.0000
Total fees in $$0.0904$0.1354$0.2704$0.4954$0.9454$9.0954
Total fees in BPS18.113.510.89.99.59.1

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E-commerce / Card Not Present Transactions:

Transaction size$50$100$250$500$1,000$10,000
Average fixed cost$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.0454$0.1954
Average variable cost$0.0500$0.1000$0.2500$0.5000$1.0000$10.00
Total fees in $$0.0954$0.1454$0.2954$0.5454$1.0454$10.1954
Total fees in BPS19.114.511.810.910.510.2

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Cross-border Transactions

The below estimates are for a cross-border (international) POS purchase transaction:
  • In-store / Card Present vs. E-commerce / Card Not Present transactions
  • Fixed cost includes per transaction Activity Fees
  • Variable cost includes per GMV Issuer Cross Border Fees, Activity Fees and Issuer Assessment Fees
For cross-border transactions, the added cost compared to domestic transactions is typically ~100 BPS. For that reason, the recommendation is for you to charge the end-customer a foreign transaction fee. See Controls for cross-border card transactions. NOTE: There are network rebates available to scaled programs that can lower these fees materially.

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In-store / Card Present Transactions:

Transaction size$50$100$250$500$1,000$10,000
Average fixed cost$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.4781
Average variable cost$0.4750$0.9500$2.3750$4.7500$9.5000$95.0000
Total fees in $$0.9031$1.3781$2.8031$5.1781$9.9281$95.4781
Total fees in BPS180.62137.81112.12103.5699.2895.48

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E-commerce / Card Not Present Transactions:

Transaction size$50$100$250$500$1,000$10,000
Average fixed cost$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.4281$0.5781
Average variable cost$0.4800$0.9600$2.4000$4.8000$9.6000$96.0000
Total fees in $$0.9081$1.3881$2.8281$5.2281$10.0281$96.5781
Total fees in BPS181.62138.81113.12104.56100.2896.58

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Appendix - Fee Details

NOTE: All fees listed are based on fees seen to date. The list of fees and rates may change with scenarios and as the network updates their pricing.

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Issuer Cross-Border Fees

The GMV-based fee on cross-border transactions is listed in the table below. This fee is billed to you on a monthly basis.
FeeRate
Issuer Cross-Border - Billed per cross-border purchase transaction, including chargeback activity0.009/0.009 / volume

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Activity Fees

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Activity Fees on domestic transactions:

The standard Activity Fees on domestic transactions are listed in the table below. These fees are billed to you on a monthly basis.
FeeRate
Tiered Authorization Issuer Processing Fee: Billed per domestic authorization message (for both approvals and declines)0.0065−0.0065 - 0.011 / transaction
Network Access/Brand Usage Fee Domestic : Billed per domestic authorization (for both approvals and declines) and first presentment messages$0.0185 / transaction
Tiered IPM Issuer Domestic (Clearing Fee) : Billed per domestic first presentment messages0.01−0.01 - 0.02 / transaction
Investment Fee : Billed on total settled domestic $-volume - used for network investments0.0004/0.0004 / -volume
Automated Fuel Dispenser Completion Message Domestic : Billed per domestic authorization completion message for an AFD transaction$0.0035 / transaction

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Activity Fees on cross-border transactions:

The standard Activity Fees on cross-border transactions are listed in the table below. These fees are billed to you on a monthly basis.
FeeRate
Tiered Authorization Issuer Processing Fee International : Billed per cross-border authorization message (for both approvals and declines)$0.3 / transaction
Clearing Issuer Fee - International : Billed per cross-border first presentment messages$0.125 / transaction
Automated Fuel Dispenser Completion Message International : Billed per cross-border authorization completion message for an AFD transaction$0.005 / transaction

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Activity Fees on both domestic and cross-border transactions:

The standard Activity Fees on both domestic and cross-border transactions are listed in the table below. These fees are billed to you on a monthly basis. These fees are mainly related to Mastercard’s chargeback, fraud and security services, including Mastercard MasterCom system, Mastercard Safety Net Fraud Services and Mastercard Security Resiliency Program. For the Mastercard Security Resiliency Program, Card Present (CP) will be assessed at 0.5 bps per authorization request, with a minimum of 0.0025andamaximumof0.0025 and a maximum of 0.05. Card Not Present (CNP) will be assessed at 1.5 bps per authorization request, with a minimum of 0.0075andamaximumof0.0075 and a maximum of 0.15.
FeeRate
Card Not Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed for the −valueofanauthorizationrequest(forbothapprovalsanddeclines)thatisequaltoorgreaterthan-value of an authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is equal to or greater than 50.000.00015/0.00015 / -volume
Card Not Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed per authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is less than $50.00$0.0075 / transaction
Card Not Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed per authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is greater than $1,000.00$0.15 / transaction
Card Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed for the −valueofanauthorizationrequest(forbothapprovalsanddeclines)thatisequaltoorgreaterthan-value of an authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is equal to or greater than 50.000.00005/0.00005 / -volume
Card Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed per authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is less than $50.00$0.0025 / transaction
Card Present Security Resiliency Fee : Billed per authorization request (for both approvals and declines) that is greater than $1,000.00$0.05 / transaction
MasterCard Safety Net Service Fee : Billed per authorization (for both approvals and declines) and first presentment messages$0.002* / transaction
Mastercard Connectivity Fee : Billed for connectivity to the Mastercard Authorization Platform - for bytes sent and received in an auth/clearing message$0.00000224** / byte
MasterCom Claims Manager : Billed per claim (= dispute submitted to network)1.35−1.35 - 3.05 / opened claim
Mastercom Collaboration Fee : Billed per dispute resolved using Mastercom Collaboration before the formal chargeback process$0.50 / resolved claim
Chargeback Support Documentation Transaction Value Fee : Billed for adding documentation to chargeback and second presentment transactions within MasterCom - billed per total chargeback $-volume0.0055−0.0055 - 0.0095 / $-volume
Image Interface / API Tier Fee : Billed based on the number of accumulated monthly retrieval requests, chargebacks, and case filing transactions processed through Image Interface/API0.20−0.20 - 0.65 / item processed
  • Rate may differ if minimum charge of 300isnotreachedfortheperiod\*\*Ratemaydifferifminimumchargeof300 is not reached for the period \*\* Rate may differ if minimum charge of 100 is not reached for the period

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Issuer Assessment Fees:

Your program $-volumes for the previous quarter are reported to Mastercard in the Quarterly Mastercard Reporting (QMR). The related fees are listed in the table below. These fees are billed to you on a quarterly basis.
FeeRate
Card Incoming Assessment : Billed for domestic and cross-border Mastercard processed purchase $-volume0.00025−0.00025 - 0.00065 / $-volume
Mastercard Processed Cash Volume : Billed for domestic Mastercard processed cash $-volume0.001/0.001 / -volume
Non-Mastercard Processed Cash Volume : Billed for domestic non-Mastercard processed cash $-volume0.00002/0.00002 / -volume
Mastercard Processed Purchase Volume : Billed for domestic Mastercard processed purchase $-volume0.00025−0.00025 - 0.00065 / $-volume
Non-Mastercard Processed Purchase Volume : Billed for domestic non-Mastercard processed purchase $-volume0.0003/0.0003 / -volume