OTTAWA – During a recent meeting of the Senate
Standing Committee on National Finance, Senator Pierrette Ringuette asked
representatives of Treasury
Board Canada to supply information regarding the cost to the government, crown
corporations and parks of credit card merchant fees charges on all
transactions.
In a written
response, Public Works and Government Services Canada provided the following
information;
“For fiscal year
2009/10, the Receiver General for Canada paid $12,956,176 to cover credit card
merchant fees for federal government departments that accept payment for goods
and services by Visa, MasterCard and American Express. This figure does not
include Crown Corporations, who do their own credit card procurement. Merchant
acceptance fees for Parks Canada totaled $799,370.”
Following the
revelation of the high costs of paying merchants fees, ranging from 2 to 3% of
each transaction, Senator Ringuette released the following statement;
“Canadians are paying
almost $13 million dollars a year, not including Crown Corporations, to giant
corporations like VISA and MasterCard.
That is taxpayers’ money going directly into the pockets of corporations
who are making record profits, instead of being used to fund programs and
infrastructure that will help Canadians.
Australia capped
merchant fees for municipal, provincial, and federal governments at 0.33% 7
years ago. Under that cap, the federal government and the Canadian taxpayer
would have saved over $10 million in 2009/10 alone.
In addition, these costs are not borne by those
who choose to use the cards, but by all of us through decreased government
revenues.
It’s time that the government step up and ensure that the money provided
by taxpayers to operate government programs beneficial to all Canadians goes to
those programs and not into the very deep pockets of big business. My bill,
S-201 will do that and I hope Senators and MPs from all parties will recognize
the need to transparently and efficiently manage taxpayers money.”