According to reports, Amazon say that they will no longer accept payment from UK issued Visa Credit cards from January 19th 2022 in a move that could push Visa to lower their fees for the platform.
The decision to stop accepting Visa credit cards and create payment limitations seems to be due to high transaction fees. Visa have said in a statement that they are working to resolve the issue of these restrictions being imposed by Amazon. The restrictions will only be implemented for Visa credit cards, customers will still be able to use Visa debit cards and other payment providers.
“We have a long-standing relationship with Amazon, and we continue to work toward a resolution, so our cardholders can use their preferred Visa credit cards at Amazon U.K. without Amazon-imposed restrictions come January 2022.”
– Visa spokesperson
Visa and MasterCard increased their UK-EU interchange fees this year due to the EU fee cap for the UK being removed after Brexit. Amazon have expressed their disapproval towards Visa applying such high fees and Visa are disappointed that the marketplace will be restricting customer choice.
“The cost of accepting card payments continues to be an obstacle for businesses striving to provide the best prices for customers, These costs should be going down over time with technological advancements, but instead, they continue to stay high or even rise.”
– Amazon spokesperson
5 Responses
Amazon can talk !
maybe Amazon should apply their own statement to lowering their fees,
what an absolute joke
Like everyone else I got this email.
They however sent another one last night that they will continue to accept VISA credit cards on business accounts.
As someone who lives overseas, and uses their UK issued visa credit card to buy presents from Amazon UK for friends and families, I will no longer be able to buy from the platform if this goes ahead. Not the end of the world of course, I will simply find other outlets, but it was convenient.
It’s goodbye Amazon UK from me.
Seeing as it doesn’t actually come into force until January I highly suspect before it comes in there will be another press release anouncing that Visa and Amazon have come to an agreement and Amazon will continue to accept Visa Credit Cards. Given the high amount of press this has got it’s in both companies interests to do so.
They will probably be launching their own credit card to hoover up all those fees themselves