Your processing rate can change without your agreement

Most merchant agreements permit the processor to change rates during the contract term on written notice. Continuing to process after the notice period is generally treated as acceptance. Here is a partial record of 2026.

What changed, and when

Increases are not always applied uniformly across a provider's book. Merchant Cost Consulting reported a Global Payments notice raising one client's discount rate by 2.25% effective August 2026, which is 225 basis points, or an additional $22,500 per million dollars processed.

Why it's hard to respond to

Platforms that bundle POS software with payment processing don't let you change processors without replacing the whole system. Toast, for example, requires merchants to use its processing and doesn't permit third-party processors; its merchant agreement allows processing rate increases during the contract term on 30 days' written notice.

When the software and the processing are one contract, shopping the rate means a full migration: new hardware, a new menu build, and retraining your staff. Most operators look at that and absorb the increase instead. Which is, structurally, the point.

If your processor raised your rate, check the notice

The Code of Conduct for the Payment Card Industry in Canada sets out what a fee-change notice has to contain. Under the version effective 30 October 2024, a notice from your acquirer or a downstream participant is expected to state the previous and new amounts, identify whether the change originated with the card network or with the acquirer, and disclose how much of it is being passed on to you.

It is also expected to tell you the date by which you can exit your agreement without penalty. Under the Code that window runs for 70 calendar days after the change takes effect. Where your agreement carries no fixed term or cancellation penalty, the notice should remind you that you are free to leave at any time.

Two limits are worth understanding before you act on this. The exit right attaches to changes made by your acquirer or processor, not to interchange rates set by the card networks, and not to fee changes that follow a schedule already written into your agreement. And the Code binds payment card network operators along with the acquirers and downstream participants beneath them; how it applies to your particular contract depends on that contract.

So when a notice arrives, the useful question isn't only whether your rate went up. It's who raised it, and whether the notice told you when your window closes. If you no longer have the notice, your provider should be able to produce a copy.

This is a summary of a published federal code, not legal advice. If it looks like a window may be open to you, confirm the position against your own merchant agreement and take advice before serving notice.

What a discount program changes

When the cost of credit acceptance is carried at the point of sale rather than out of your margin, a rate change on your statement doesn't land on your P&L the way it used to.

To be clear about the limits: it does not protect you from subscription fees, annual fees, device fees, or online ordering fees. Those are separate line items and they still hit. It reduces your exposure to processing rate changes specifically, which is generally the largest of the moving parts but not the only one.

It also doesn't remove the value of knowing your own numbers. If you'd like to see where you actually stand, here's how to work out your effective rate in about ten minutes.