Short answer: Ontario businesses can add a surcharge to credit card payments, capped at their cost of accepting the card and never more than 2.4%. Debit and prepaid cards can’t be surcharged, customers must be told before they pay, and surcharging is not allowed in Quebec.
Why surcharging became possible
For years, card network rules stopped Canadian merchants from adding a fee for paying by credit card. Following a class-action settlement, Visa and Mastercard changed their rules in October 2022, and Canadian merchants have been allowed to surcharge credit card transactions since then — within limits.
The rules, in plain English
- Credit cards only. You can’t surcharge Interac debit or prepaid cards. Debit stays a normal sale.
- A cap of 2.4% — and no more than what it actually costs you to accept that card. You can’t profit from the surcharge.
- Tell customers before they pay. Disclosure is required where customers enter your business and at the point of sale, and the surcharge has to appear as its own line on the receipt.
- Notify before you start. The card networks require notice before you begin surcharging. Your processor handles or guides this.
- Not in Quebec. Quebec’s consumer protection law prohibits surcharging, so it doesn’t apply to sales there.
- Each card brand has its own fine print. American Express, for example, has separate rules. We confirm what applies to your card mix at setup.
Rules can change, and this guide isn’t legal advice. We review it regularly and confirm the current rules with every merchant before a surcharge program goes live.
What a surcharge program actually saves
Take a business processing $25,000 a month, with 70% paid by credit and an average sale of $35. On our published Surcharge plan, credit is surcharged at 2.40% to the cardholder and debit costs a flat $0.05 per transaction. That works out to roughly $10.71 a month in fees paid by the business, with about $420 of credit card cost passed to customers who chose to pay by credit.
On the same month, a flat 2.50% rate would cost the business about $509. You can run your own numbers in our cost calculator.
Will customers mind?
Some will. That’s why the debit option matters — anyone who would rather not pay the surcharge can tap their debit card at no extra cost. Many of our merchants run surcharging without trouble; one told us on Trustpilot it is “saving us hundreds of dollars monthly.”
If your customers are very sensitive to price, or your average ticket is large, a transparent interchange-plus plan may be the better fit. We’ll tell you which one wins for your business.
How a surcharge program works with GT Payments
- We look at your card mix and confirm surcharging makes sense for your business.
- We set up the terminal so the surcharge is calculated and disclosed automatically at checkout.
- We tell you exactly what signage you need at your entrance and counter.
- Debit stays at a straightforward $0.05 per transaction.
Questions about your situation? Call 416-640-0902 or ask for a surcharge quote.