Visa Inc. spent $1.69 million in the third quarter to lobby the federal government on the regulation of debit card fees charged to merchants and other issues, according to a disclosure report.

via Visa spent $1.69M on federal lobbying in 3Q – BusinessWeek.

The dust has barely settled over the debit card fee-flap but there’s more news from the big banks regarding fees. The good news is that it’s not all bad this time — both Bank of America and Chase have abandoned fees that were under consideration or in the testing phase. Meanwhile, though, banks are quietly calculating which other ones can take their place.

via Get Ready For Bank Fee Whack-A-Mole | Moneyland | TIME.com.

The top 10 retail banks are projected to lose $185 billion in deposits over the next year if they dont address consumer concerns, according to a recent study from cg42, a firm that consults with banks. Bank of America, Citibank, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo account for nearly three-quarters of the loss, the study found.

via Debit Card Fee Debacle: Big Banks Could Lose $185 Billion In Deposits Next Year, Report Finds.

Call for antitrust investigation

A day after the anti-Durbin bill was introduced, congressional Democrats asked Attorney General Eric Holder to consider an anti-trust investigation of financial institutions on grounds they are colluding to create new fees to cover losses related to the Durbin Amendment’s debit interchange fee cap.

On Oct. 13, 2011, five Democratic congressmen led by Chief Deputy Whip Peter Welch, D-Vt., wrote Holder asking for the anti-trust investigation of “big banks [that] are coordinating their fee strategies in violation of federal anti-trust laws.”

via The Green Sheet :: E-Magazine :: Washington takes a second look at Durbin.

For years, banks have had an arsenal of fees they could charge consumers to increase revenues, said Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director of U.S. Public Interest Research Group, which published a report, Big Banks, Bigger Fees, earlier this year.

via After Debit Card Uproar, Banks Look to Sneaky Fees – ABC News.

Not content to own just Mastercard (MA), Warren Buffett added Visa (V) to Berkshire Hathaway’s (BRKB) portfolio in the third quarter, according to a filing released after the market closed. Buffett reported owning 2.29 million shares of Visa in the quarter. He maintained his stake in MasterCard, which he also added to the portfolio this year, at 405,000 shares.

via Berkshire: Buffett Buys Millions in Visa and CVS Stock – Stocks To Watch Today – Barrons.com.

Intel Corporation and MasterCard Incorporated announced today a multi-year strategic collaboration to further enhance the security and consumer payment experience for online shopping. “MasterCard is constantly working to improve the shopping experience for consumers and merchants”The collaboration will combine MasterCard’s expertise in payment processing and commerce with Intel’s strengths in silicon innovation and chip-based security. It is designed to provide more options for a safer and simpler checkout process for online merchants and consumers using Ultrabook™ devices and future generations of Intel-based PCs.

via Intel and MasterCard Join Forces to Enhance the Consumer Payment Experience for Online Shopping | Business Wire.

Banga didn’t say that any settlement was imminent, either in the class action or in suits brought by individual merchants including Publix Super Markets Inc. (PUSH), the Lakeland, Florida-based supermarket chain, and Rite Aid Corp. (RAD), the Camp Hill, Pennsylvania-based drugstore chain.

‘via Visa, MasterCard Estimate Potential Fee Settlement at $4 Billion- Bloomberg.

Bank of America retreated this week from its planned introduction of a $5 monthly fee for many customers to use their debit cards. The bank said it “listened to our customers very closely” and decided that charging people money to access their money maybe wasn’t the best idea after all.

via David Lazarus; Bank of America; Chase – latimes.com.

 http://latimes.vid.trb.com/player/PaperVideoTest.swf

Nearly eight years after Visa Inc and MasterCard Inc agreed to pay more than $3 billion to resolve allegations that they conspired to raise stores’ fees for processing their payment cards, merchants returned to court on Wednesday to argue that the card companies still maintain a costly stranglehold on interchange networks.

U.S. District Judge John Gleeson heard oral arguments in Brooklyn federal court from a slate of lawyers representing the credit card companies, their issuing banks and the merchants over whether to proceed to trial on the latest round of antitrust allegations against the card companies’ and banks’ interchange networks, which process customers’ credit- and debit-card payments to stores.

via Visa, MasterCard still fixing card fees -merchants | News by Country | Reuters.

Minneapolis attorney K. Craig Wildfang, lead attorney for the class plaintiffs, said he would not comment about the MasterCard disclosure. But Mitch Goldstone, president and chief executive of one of the named class plaintiffs, ScanMyPhotos.com in Irvine, Calif., said he believes the Occupy Wall Street anti-corporate demonstrators and their sympathizers are having an effect on the defendants.

“I’m having the best level of comfort since 2005 that this could be resolved very quickly,” Goldstone says. “Those [Occupy Wall Street participants] are the people that are going to be jurors next fall. The banks know it.”

Trial is set to start Sept. 12, 2012.

http://www.digitaltransactions.net/news/story/3262

Nearly eight years after Visa Inc and MasterCard Inc agreed to pay more than $3 billion to resolve allegations that they conspired to raise stores’ fees for processing their payment cards, merchants returned to court on Wednesday to argue that the card companies still maintain a costly stranglehold on interchange networks.

via Visa, MasterCard still fixing card fees -merchants | News by Country | Reuters.

Mallory Duncan is Senior Vice President and General Counsel of the National Retail Federation (www.nrf.com), the world’s largest retail trade association whose global membership includes more than 1.5 million American companies that employ nearly 25 million workers. Readers may write him at NRF, 325 7th Street NW, Suite 1100, Washington, DC 20004.

via Decision to impose monthly surcharges on debit cards gouges unwary consumers | McClatchy.

Signs like, “I bailed out the banks and all I got was a $5 debit card fee” have been spotted the Occupy Wall Street protest in New York and its sibling protests around the country. The author of the regulations, Sen. Richard Durbin, D.-Ill, called the fee an “outrage” on the floor of the Senate.

via Chase and Wells Fargo drop debit card fee tests; Bank of America set to adjust its plan – The Washington Post.

Next on the agenda will be reform of credit card fees, which are even more excessive than debit fees and just as obscure.

In 2010, the banking industry raked in about $30 billion in swipe fees on credit card transactions – over and above profits on late fees, annual fees, over-the-limit fees and interest. Not only do banks require merchants to collect fees averaging 2-3 percent of each credit card transaction, until swipe fee reform passed they effectively prevented retailers from offering a discount to customers who paid with cash.

via Decision to impose monthly surcharges on debit cards gouges unwary consumers | McClatchy.

Chase and Wells Fargo are joining the list of banks that won’t be charging customers to use their debit cards, as the backlash over Bank of America’s planned $5 monthly fee continues.

via Chase and Wells Fargo drop debit card fee tests; Bank of America set to adjust its plan – The Washington Post.

“It appears that banks are seeking to justify fee increases after Congress and the Federal Reserve Board recently limited banks’ ability to collude with networks to set debit interchange fees,” the letter said. “Statements made by individual banks and their trade associations raise questions about whether some price increases that have occurred this year have actually been coordinated.”

via Vermont Congressman Says New Debit Card Fees Warrant Investigation – WBOY-TV – WBOY.com.

“Merchants are counting their new found gains at our expense and our elected officials still don’t comprehend the damaging impact of their misguided legislation,” wrote Patrick J. Swanick, a retired KeyBank vice chairman and former president of Key’s retail bank and CEO of Key Electronic Services, on October 10 in the American Banker.

via Durbin Amendment: A Weak Excuse for New Bank Fees.

“Whenever there has been frustration or negative publicity with other institutions, the credit union is where people turn,” Williams said. She added that the credit union does not plan to implement any fees on their checking accounts.

via Local banks see boost from customers fleeing fees | Daily Progress.

Greg Parker, president of Parker Cos., Savannah, Ga., has filed a lawsuit to block the state’s plan to end the way he advertises his PumpPal discount gasoline program, reported the Savannah Morning News. The suit asked Chatham County Superior Court Judge Louisa Abbot to temporarily halt new rules that would ban display of reduced debit-card gasoline prices.

via Parker Sues to Protect PumpPal Debit Program#.TpNPCcCTK5g.twitter.

“Whenever there has been frustration or negative publicity with other institutions, the credit union is where people turn,” Williams said. She added that the credit union does not plan to implement any fees on their checking accounts.

via Local banks see boost from customers fleeing fees | Daily Progress.

Protestors are calling the event “Bank Transfer Day” and are encouraging people nationwide to participate November 5.

via News Headlines.

The new $5 monthly charge has become a focal point for anger and frustration about the flailing economy and Washingtons attempts to help the nation recover from the financial crisis.

via Bank of America debit card fee prompts animosity from coast to coast – latimes.com.

The Fed had been established in 1913 in large measure to end the then widespread practice of banks’ charging a similar “interchange” fee for the use of paper checks. Those check interchange fees were slowing the growth of interstate commerce, and the Fed quickly prohibited them. The interchange fees that banks now charge stores for debit transactions are economically and functionally identical to the check interchange fees prohibited by the Fed almost a century ago.

via Debit Card Fees Are Robbery – NYTimes.com.