The federal government has been forced to delay the Australian Taxation Office’s (ATO) planned ban on the use of credit cards to pay tax bills until June 2027, following a backlash from business groups.
Credit cards can offer rewards such as frequent flyer points when they are used.
This is why I think the rollout of these surcharge changes has been weird.
The free market has failed. They ought to nationalise our payment infrastructure, including EFTPOS, and get rid of surcharges on those cards only.
Either rewards cards should be regulated that the cost HAS to be passed on to the customer, or they should be banned entirely.
International cards should still have to pay as we can’t regulate those as easily and people use visa and MasterCard (and others) when travelling here.
It’s ridiculous that we have no publically owned infrastructure for this. And it’s also very stupid that we’re now subsidising businesses in the form of $200 million in card fees.
Get another line of credit and bank transfer the ATO ffs. I fail to see how a business’ bad planning should be our collective problem.
