Visa Interchange Rates in the US: How to Read the Schedule

Where the official rates are

Visa's small business support page links two rate documents: Visa USA Interchange Reimbursement Fees and Interlink Interchange Reimbursement Fees (Interlink is Visa's PIN debit network). The Visa USA document we checked on September 16, 2026 is dated 18 April 2026 and says its tables set out the interchange reimbursement fees applied on Visa transactions completed within the 50 United States and the District of Columbia. It also says it is a supplement to the Visa Core Rules and Visa Product and Service Rules, which govern if the two conflict. Mastercard, American Express and Discover set their own pricing; this page covers only Visa's published US schedule. Do not rely on a copy of a rate table saved by a third party, including this page. Download the current document before you check a statement.

Merchants do not pay interchange directly

In Visa's words: "Merchants do not pay interchange reimbursement fees; merchants pay 'merchant discount' to their financial institution." Visa explains that merchants buy a variety of processing services from financial institutions, and all of them may be included in the merchant discount rate, which is typically a percentage per transaction. In practice, your processor or acquiring bank pays interchange to the card-issuing bank and charges you a price that covers it. On interchange-plus pricing you can see the interchange amount separately. On flat-rate or tiered pricing it is bundled, which makes it harder to check. Visa's document tells merchants with questions about which rates they are eligible for to contact their financial institution.

How the schedule is organized

The April 2026 document is split into lettered sections. Section A covers consumer debit (Visa's check card) with exempt and regulated columns. Section B covers consumer prepaid and other exempt products. Section C covers consumer credit, with separate tables for card present, card not present and a small merchant fee program. Section D sets the performance thresholds for the largest retail, supermarket and recurring telecom and cable merchants. Section E and the pages after it cover corporate, purchasing and business cards, including large ticket programs. Three things decide which row applies to a sale: the card type (debit, prepaid, consumer credit, commercial), how the card was accepted (card present, keyed, online) and the fee program your merchant category and transaction data qualify for.

Debit card rates: regulated versus exempt

The debit tables have two columns. Regulated debit cards come from issuers covered by the Federal Reserve's Regulation II, and every regulated row in the April 2026 schedule is 0.05% + $0.21, with an additional $0.01 for issuers that certify compliance with the fraud-prevention standards. Exempt debit cards have rates that vary by fee program.

Consumer credit rates depend on the card product

The consumer credit tables have six product columns, from Visa Infinite and Visa Signature Preferred cards through traditional rewards and all other products. The same fee program can carry a different rate for each product, so the table below shows the lowest and highest rate in each row rather than one number. A few programs, such as Charity and Government, carry the same rate for every product. If your statement shows a rate outside the range for the program your processor says you qualify for, ask why.

Card-not-present incentives, small merchants and large merchants

The card-not-present credit table lists incentive reductions of -0.05% (Type 1), -0.10% (Type 2) and -0.15% (Type 3). Visa says EMV token transactions qualify for Type 1, Digital Commerce Authentication Program (DCAP) transactions for Type 2, and DCAP plus EMV token transactions for Type 3, with exceptions for Charity 1 and CPS/Utility, and that the incentives require CPS qualification and are subject to change. The schedule also has a Small Merchant fee program with its own rates and a volume maximum of $280,000 in gross Visa consumer credit sales, based on 12 months of Visa system activity ending September 30, 2024; Visa refers to its U.S. Interchange Reimbursement Fee Rate Qualification Guide for full details. At the other end, the Retail and Supermarket performance thresholds in section D start in the millions of transactions and billions of dollars, so they apply only to very large merchants.

Commercial and business card rates

Corporate and purchasing cards have their own table. Examples effective April 18, 2026: Commercial Card Present 2.50% + $0.10, Commercial Card Not Present 2.70% + $0.10, Commercial Level II – Fuel 2.20% + $0.10, Commercial Product 3 1.75% + $0.10, Non-Qualified 2.95% + $0.10, and Commercial Product Large Ticket 1.30% + $35.00. The Visa Large Purchase Advantage program sets card-not-present rates by ticket size, from 0.70% + $49.50 for $10,000.01 to $25,000, down to 0.40% + $58.50 above $500,000, with purchasing card rates applying at $10,000 or less. B2B sellers should ask whether their processor passes the transaction data needed to qualify for these programs.

How to use the schedule to check a statement

1. Download the current Visa USA Interchange Reimbursement Fees document and note its date. 2. On your statement, find the interchange detail by card type and fee program; if your statement shows only one blended rate or "qualified, mid-qualified, non-qualified" tiers, ask your provider for interchange detail. 3. Match each row to the program name in Visa's schedule and check the rate. 4. Look for non-qualified and standard rows, which are the most expensive and usually point to missing data, keyed entry or late settlement. 5. Compare the total you paid with the interchange total; the difference is your provider's markup and fees. Worked example (illustration only, interchange only): on a $50.00 card present sale, the exempt CPS/Retail debit rate of 0.80% + $0.15 is $0.55, while the regulated rate of 0.05% + $0.21 is $0.235, or $0.245 with the fraud-prevention cent.

About the rate tables on this page: Visa is the only card network that publishes a public US merchant interchange schedule, so the rate tables on this site are Visa-only. Mastercard, American Express and Discover do not publish an equivalent US merchant schedule, and their rates are neither shown above nor implied by these figures. Ask your processor for the rates that apply to each network on your account.