Overview
From 1 October 2026, new rules mean businesses across Australia, including health practices, can no longer add a surcharge for customers paying by eftpos, Mastercard, or Visa. PayPal’s own no-surcharge rule follows a few days later, from 5 October 2026.
These rules come from the card networks themselves, not from Zanda or your payment provider. The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) removed its long-standing restriction that stopped card networks from banning surcharges, and eftpos, Mastercard, and Visa each decided to introduce their own no-surcharge rules once that restriction lifted. The RBA does not regulate practices directly; the card networks and your payment provider are responsible for enforcing the change.
This article covers what changed, what stays the same, and the one setting Australian practices need to check if they use the built-in Stripe integration in Zanda.
What Australian practices need to do
If your practice charges a card surcharge through the built-in Stripe integration in Zanda, you need to turn that setting off yourself. Zanda has not switched it off for you.
- Go to User Menu > Account Settings > Payments > Stripe.
- In the Add Card Processing Fees section, toggle “Add Card Processing fee when taking Stripe payments” to OFF.
- Click Save.
This setting only controls the surcharge added through the built-in Stripe integration in Zanda. It does not control surcharging through Tyro, Square, a bank-issued EFTPOS terminal, or any other payment arrangement outside Zanda. If you take card payments through one of those, check with that provider directly about whether and how they’ve removed surcharging on their side.
Important: Turning off this setting stops the built-in Stripe integration in Zanda from adding a card surcharge. It does not, by itself, confirm your practice is fully compliant with the new rules, particularly if you also take payments through other providers or terminals. Check with each payment provider you use, and seek your own advice if you’re unsure how the rules apply to your practice.
What’s changing
The RBA’s decision to stop prohibiting card-network “no-surcharge” rules is what made this possible. From there, each network set its own effective date:
| Card network | Surcharging allowed from 1 October 2026? |
|---|---|
| eftpos | No |
| Mastercard (credit, debit, and prepaid) | No |
| Visa (credit, debit, and prepaid) | No |
| American Express | No |
| UnionPay | No |
| PayPal | No, from 5 October 2026 |
This applies no matter which payment provider or terminal you use, Stripe, Tyro, Square, a bank EFTPOS machine, or anything else. The rule sits with the card network, so any provider processing payments on these networks has to stop adding a card surcharge from the relevant date.
There’s no blanket exemption for business-to-business payments. Card payments between businesses are covered by the same no-surcharge rules unless a specific card network’s own rules provide an exemption.
What stays the same
- Underlying payment processing costs haven’t gone away. Stripe, your bank, or another provider will still charge your practice a fee for accepting card payments. These changes stop you passing that cost on to the client as a separate surcharge line item; they don’t remove the cost itself.
- Other surcharges and fees that don’t depend on how someone pays are unaffected. Weekend or public holiday surcharges, booking fees, and genuine service fees unrelated to the payment method can still apply. The new rules only cover a surcharge added specifically because a client paid by card.
- Reviewing your prices is a separate, optional decision, not a requirement. Nothing about these rules requires you to change your prices. Some practices choose to fold their average card processing cost into their standard prices instead of charging it separately; that’s a business decision you can make independently of switching off the surcharge setting above.
If you do decide to adjust your prices
This is entirely optional, and it’s a separate step from turning off the surcharge setting. For illustration only: if an appointment currently costs $100 plus a 1.5% card surcharge ($1.50, so $101.50 at checkout), a practice that wants to keep collecting the same amount could instead set its standard price at $101.50, with no separate surcharge line. The figures here are just an example, not a Zanda-recommended fee or margin.
Whatever you decide, don’t rename a card surcharge as a “service fee,” “administration fee,” or similar to keep charging it under a different label. The ACCC treats that as potentially misleading conduct under the Australian Consumer Law, since it attempts to recreate a card payment surcharge the rules no longer allow.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are card surcharges still allowed from October 2026?
No. From 1 October 2026, eftpos, Mastercard, Visa, American Express, and UnionPay no longer allow a card payment surcharge. PayPal’s no-surcharge rule follows from 5 October 2026. See What Australian practices need to do above for the Zanda setting to check.
Are Stripe (or other provider) processing fees being removed?
No. Your practice will still pay the underlying payment processing fees your provider charges for accepting card payments. What’s changed is that you can no longer pass that cost on to clients as a separate card surcharge.
Is this a change made by Zanda or Stripe?
No. The Reserve Bank of Australia removed its restriction on card networks banning surcharges, and eftpos, Mastercard, and Visa each chose to introduce their own no-surcharge rules as a result. It isn’t a Zanda policy or a Stripe decision, and we don’t control whether or when it applies. For what it’s worth, we’d have preferred practices kept the choice to pass on processing costs as they could before.
Will Zanda turn off my card surcharge for me, or do I need to do it myself?
You need to do it yourself. See What Australian practices need to do above for the exact steps.
Does this apply to business-to-business payments?
Yes, in general. There’s no blanket exemption for payments between businesses, including payments from a health fund, referrer, or another organization. A card network’s own rules could in principle carve out an exception, but none of the designated networks (eftpos, Mastercard, Visa) currently do.
Further reading
- ACCC guidance on card surcharges (a practical explanation of the changes for businesses, including what counts as a surcharge and what doesn’t)
- The RBA Conclusions Paper (the full regulatory detail behind the change)