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The claim that it will benefity consumers is dubious at best.  When Durbin went into effect in the US, capping debit interchange I didn't notice any reduction in prices from retailers, so they gained the benefit of reduced fees.  Consumers, on the other hand, paid more in fees as banks looked for other ways to make up that revenue.   Not saying this will happen here, but will be interesting to see if the retailers are passing on these savings to consumers or just pocketing the difference.

I'm with Stanley...the government is shifting the burden to the consumer at that point.  There are costs associated with maintaining an account linked to a card and not everyone necessarily wants their personal data potentially exposed with every purchase.  It's interesting because so many merchants complain about the "burden" associated with the costs of using card networks.  In the end, the consumer will lose.

It will be interesting if this has actually any benefit to the consumer.  In the US, where there have been some limited restrictions placed on debit interchange, the merchants just reduced their costs but savings were not passed onto consumers.  In fact, consumers ended up paying more because issuers (banks) needed to find ways to make up for that lost revenue stream.