title: Canada — Scheme & Network Compliance | World Payments Monitor canonical: https://payments.gi/jurisdictions/canada/w4/ publisher: Asymmetric Intelligence ### W4 Scheme & Network Compliance Confirmed confirmed 2026-06-27 Card-scheme economics are governed by negotiated interchange-reduction agreements with Visa and Mastercard (effective October 19, 2024), a revised federal Code of Conduct for the Payment Card Industry (effective October 30, 2024), and Interac's domestic debit rules including a surcharge cap. Canada has historically had among the world's highest interchange; small-business credit interchange now targets an in-store weighted average of 0.95%. Standing sub-brief · as of 27 June 2026 183 words · last cycle 2026-06-27 #### Scheme & Network Compliance Canada historically had among the world's highest interchange, and the negotiated reductions reframe domestic card-scheme economics. Visa and Mastercard cut domestic consumer credit interchange for qualifying small businesses to an in-store annual weighted-average of 0.95% (with online consumer-credit interchange cut 10bps), effective October 19, 2024, alongside a revised Code of Conduct for the Payment Card Industry effective October 30, 2024. The reductions are expected to save eligible small businesses around C$1bn over five years; small-business thresholds apply (Visa under $300k, Mastercard under $175k in sales), and the Code shortened complaint response to 20 business days. On the debit side, Interac imposes a point-of-sale surcharge cap of $0.25 per transaction (effective January 26, 2024), prohibits surcharging on remote Interac Mobile Debit, and increased its Debit Switch Fee to $0.02099 effective November 1, 2025 — the latter sourced from a Tier-3 vendor document and carried as a dated entry. #### Outlook The scheme-rule changes are established. Watch for downstream effects of the interchange cuts on scheme behaviour beyond cards, and for any further Interac fee adjustments tied to the broader rail modernisation. no periodic updates on record for this sub-brief ** Sources and findings (3)** 1. T1 [https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/news/2024/10/government-reduces-credit-card-fees-by-27-per-cent-for-small-business-owners.html](https://www.canada.ca/en/department-finance/news/2024/10/government-reduces-credit-card-fees-by-27-per-cent-for-small-business-owners.html) retrieved 2026-06-27 2. T1 [https://www.canada.ca/en/innovation-science-economic-development/news/2023/12/government-of-canada-announces-finalized-agreements-with-visa-and-mastercard-to-lower-credit-card-transaction-fees-for-small-businesses.html](https://www.canada.ca/en/innovation-science-economic-development/news/2023/12/government-of-canada-announces-finalized-agreements-with-visa-and-mastercard-to-lower-credit-card-transaction-fees-for-small-businesses.html) retrieved 2026-06-27 3. T3 [https://docs.payfacto.com/payfacto-knowledge/canada-doc-center/general-information/card-brand-network-fee-updates](https://docs.payfacto.com/payfacto-knowledge/canada-doc-center/general-information/card-brand-network-fee-updates) retrieved 2026-06-27