Key Takeaways:
- Mastercard’s Undefined Authorization Fee is increasing to 0.30% ($0.05 minimum).
- Visa Commercial card network fees are increasing on January 24, 2026.
- MC MOTO Fee will be assessed on all authorizations (including declined).
- New $75 cap on Mastercard MOTO declined transactions.
- Merchants may see a significant increase in debit card interchange rates routed through Discover’s network.
Major interchange updates from the card networks typically come in April and October. But it’s also common to see slight changes go into effect for the new year.
Here’s what’s changing in January 2026, plus what you can expect for the rest of the year:
Visa 2026 Interchange Updates
The biggest card network changes from Visa are still tied to its CEDP program that launched in phases last year. This is part of Visa’s broader strategy to ensure merchants are submitting accurate enhanced data on commercial transactions—rewarding those who do with lower rates and charging more at the interchange level if data is missing.
Effective January 24, 2026, Visa is increasing rates for Product 3 business credits submitted with Level 2 data.
And then on April 16, 2026, Visa’s Level 2 data program is officially sunsetting altogether.
So we’re in the final months where verified non-fuel merchants can still submit L2 data to get reduced CEDP rates. After that mid-April date, you’ll need to submit Level 3 data to qualify for the reduction.
Note: There’s still a 0.05% assessment on all Visa CEDP transaction volume.
Mastercard 2026 Interchange Updates
Effective January 1, 2026, Mastercard is increasing its Undefined Authorization Fee to 0.30% (up from 0.25%).
The minimum fee on MC Undefined Auth charges is also increasing to $0.05 (up from $0.04).
This was all previously announced and aligned with Mastercard’s Transaction Processing Excellence (TPE) program, designed to encourage proper authorization standards.
Undefined Authorization Fees are the highest TPE penalties, and this is the second rate hike we’ve seen in just 7 months. There’s another increase on MC Undefined Auth Fees planned for January 2027 as well to further discourage merchants from submitting authorization requests that aren’t properly categorized.
Also effective January 1, 2026, Mastercard is changing the way it calculates Mail/Telephone Order (MOTO) Fees.
The fee itself is staying the same, and will continue to be assessed at 0.015%. But rather than charging this only to cleared transactions, Mastercard is now charging its US MOTO Fee on all authorizations (including declined auths).
For Mail/Telephone transactions over $500, Mastercard is introducing a $75 fee cap on declined transactions.
American Express 2026 Interchange Updates
American Express has not publicly announced any major interchange changes for January 2026 or April 2026 just yet. Though there is still plenty of time for them to make changes between now and April.
Instead, Amex has focused its efforts on annual fees and benefits for some of its flagship consumer products for 2026.
For example, the annual fee on the Amex Platinum card increased to $895 per year (up from $695) on January 2, 2026. There are also some changes to the card’s hotel credit benefit, dining credits, digital entertainment credit, and other benefits.
I’ll be curious to see if Amex adjusts its interchange rates accordingly in the near future to account for these benefit changes, as the $200 annual fee increase may not be enough to cover the cardholder perks.
Discover 2026 Interchange Updates
Similarly to Amex, Discover hasn’t yet announced any interchange updates for 2026 either. But there are still a couple of important things that merchants accepting Discover should keep an eye on this year.
Since Capital One officially completed its merger with Discover last year, debit interchange fees are set to increase on more cards.
Discover is a closed-loop network, which means it’s exempt from the Durbin Amendment that caps regulated debit card fees at 0.05% + $0.22. And now that the merger is complete, Capital One can start using Discover’s network to bypass debit interchange caps.
So Capital One debit cards that were mostly routed through Mastercard’s network will be routed to Discover’s network as early as January 2026.
Debit interchange rates going through Discover’s network could be as high as 1.10% + $0.16 per transaction for card-present transactions and 1.20% + $0.05 for CNP transactions.
For merchants processing Capital One-branded debit cards, this means that your interchange fees can increase over 20x per transaction this year, which is unprecedentedly high.
Other Card Network Updates to Keep an Eye on in 2026
As always, you’ll want to keep a close eye on major interchange announcements ahead of April 2026. This is when we typically see Visa and Mastercard adjust their rates.
This year will be particularly interesting because of what’s happening around the Visa/Mastercard interchange settlement. The latest proposal from November 2025 is still pending court approval. But we’re expecting a decision early in 2026.
If approved, the networks have agreed to lower interchange rates by 0.10% over the next five years, while capping standard cards at 1.25%. So in theory, this can be applied as early as this year.
But I still have my doubts that the latest iteration will be approved because I simply don’t think it does enough to help merchants. And I’m hoping the courts will agree.
Speaking of settlements, the deadline for merchants to file a claim in the $1.225 billion class action lawsuit against Discover is May 18, 2026.
This is for businesses that accepted Discover cards between 2007 and 2023. The lawsuit alleges that Discover misclassified consumer cards as commercial cards, pushing them into higher interchange tiers.