Visa and Mastercard have been accused of charging ‘excessive’ fees which could cost shoppers an extra £40 per year

Visa and Mastercard have been accused of charging excessive fees during the coronavirus pandemic. This comes after businesses were forced to shift towards card payments to adhere to social distancing rules.

UK retail groups have said that fees charged by the financial companies have almost doubled in the last two years. The extra costs could potentially be passed on to consumers, with credit card bills increasing by another £40 per year.

‘An abuse of a dominant market position’

Head of finance policy at the British Retail Consortium (BRC), Andrew Cregan, told the BBC, “It’s an abuse of a dominant market position by these companies. They’re two of the most profitable organisations in the world and they’ve got merchants over a barrel.”

In the BRC’s latest Payments Survey, card schemes were found to be the “least competitive layer of the card payments ecosystem”, with Visa and Mastercard controlling 98 per cent of the UK Market.

Cregan added, “It is vital that the government takes action to tackle excessive card costs. If a phone or energy company increased their fees by such an amount there would be an uproar.”