Electronic payment: To better understand the commission borne by merchants
On the eve of the dismantling of the electronic payment monopoly held by CMI (Centre Monétique Interbancaire), many merchants are asking themselves questions. Some are still finding it difficult to read the current offers.
The amount of commission to be deducted by the payment institution for each transaction is the aspect that raises the most questions.
Royalties paid to one or other of the card networks
«In fact, to understand the structure of electronic payment fees or the cost of a transaction, you need to know that the commission is made up of five main components. The most important is the interchange fee, or the commission paid to the card issuer, which may be a Moroccan or foreign bank», explains Ismail Bellali, electronic payment expert and founder of Unipay.ma, a consulting firm specializing in digital payment methods.
As a reminder, the central bank (Bank Al-Maghrib) had capped interchange fees at 0.65% as part of the decision taken in conjunction with the Competition Council concerning the virtual monopoly of the interbank electronic payments center (Centre Monétique Interbancaire, CMI). The commission also includes scheme or payment scheme fees. These are royalties paid to one or other of the Visa or Mastercard networks for the logo on their cards.
Another component of the commission paid by the merchant is the processing fee. These cover remuneration for the technical processing of commercial transactions, which may be either outsourced or carried out by an in-house structure.
As a reminder, the CMI is set to become a processing platform for electronic payment operators by next November, as it will no longer be authorized to sign direct contracts with merchants.
Added to this are the costs associated with the equipment provided to the merchant, in this case the electronic payment (POS) terminal (and its installation.
Finally, there’s the payment acquirer’s margin, which is a commission paid to the acquirer and varies between 0.20% and 0.80% of the transaction amount.
In practice, therefore, a Moroccan cardholder paying in a restaurant, hotel, or clothing store will be charged an interchange fee of around 0.65%. This fee is 0.55% at supermarkets, grocery stores, tobacconists, and bakeries, and 0.15% at service stations. For foreign bankcards, these fees average 1.6% of the transaction amount.
In addition to interchange fees, there are scheme fees, which are charges to cover the use of payment systems. Their amount is set by the payment networks. They are around 0.1% for domestic transactions and 0.8% for international transactions.
Hassan EL ARIF
