In addition to the interchange fees charged by American Express for each transaction, there are other fees imposed at the card network level by Amex.
Also known as pass-through fees, assessments are paid directly to American Express, often based on a percentage of the total transaction volume in a billing cycle. But there are some other flat-rate and one-off fees that American Express charges to merchants accepting this card brand.
If your business currently accepts American Express or you’re planning to accept American Express, you can really benefit from using this guide as a quick reference. Not only will it help you understand what you’re being charged and why, but it can also help ensure that your processor isn’t over-charging you by “padding” assessments.
Below you’ll find each American Express assessment fee, along with the rate and its description.
Non-Swipe Transaction Fee
Amount: 0.30% per transaction
Description: Also known as the Amex Card Not Present (CNP) Fee, merchants are charged up to 0.30% per transaction if Amex does not receive the full magnetic stripe or chip data, which would happen for online transactions, phone transactions, card on file transactions, and manually keyed transactions.
Amex Voice Authorization Fee
Amount: $0.65 per authorization
Description: Charged each time a merchant needs to call American Express to authorize a transaction. This can occur if your POS system is down or your POS system is not compatible. Merchants can request authorization via telephone, but they’ll be charged $0.65 for each occurrence.
Amex Check Fee
Amount: $1.50 per check
Description: This assessment is charged any time that Amex needs to issue or create a check for a merchant.
Amex Inbound Fee
Amount: 1%
Description: Assessed on any transaction for an Amex-branded card that was issued outside of the United States. This includes cards issued in Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, and other US territories.
Monthly Gross Pay Fee
Amount: 0.03%
Description: This only applies to merchants enrolled in the Amex monthly gross pay program. With this option, fees are accumulated throughout the month and only deducted once at the end of each billing cycle, as opposed to being deducted up front for each transaction.
Amex Paper Statement Fee
Amount: $7.95 per statement
Description: Merchants who elect to receive paper statements over digital statements may be charged up to $7.95, which covers Amex’s costs to create, print, and mail statements each month.
Amex Paper Submission Rate
Amount: Varies
Description: If a merchant chooses to submit transactions through paper submissions, they’ll be charged a higher discount rate compared to electronic submissions. This fee varies depending on the interchange category.
Amex Technical Specifications Non-Compliance Fee
Amount: 0.75% per transaction
Description: Assessed on all transactions that do not comply with Amex’s technical specifications. It applies regardless of whether you’re on the Amex OptBlue program and using a third-party processor or if you have a direct agreement with American Express.
Amex Excessive Chargeback Fee
Amount: $25 per chargeback
Description: American Express considers chargebacks to be “excessive” if a merchant has three consecutive months in which the ratio of chargebacks to gross Amex charges exceeds 1%. Merchants will be hit with a $25 fee per chargeback over the 1% ratio in each month after the excessive chargeback threshold has been met.
Amex Authorization Integrity Fee
Amount: 0.10% of approved authorization volume, plus $0.05 per approved charge.
Description: If more than 10% of approved charges aren’t properly processed for three consecutive months, Amex will begin applying this fee in the third month. This encourages merchants to maintain accurate and timely authorizations. While 0.10% plus $0.05 per approved charge is the fee for most merchants, it’s worth noting that air charters or fraction aircraft businesses face a higher rate of 1% of the approved authorization volume.
Gateway Fee
Amount: Varies
Description: Assessed when merchants route authorization requests to Amex through Visa or Mastercard gateways. Since Visa and Mastercard charge American Express for using those gateways, Amex ultimately passes those fees to the merchant. The cost varies depending on which gateway the transaction is routed through and is also based on the monthly volume of authorization requests that go through these other payment gateways.
American Express Data Pass Violation Fee
Amount: $2,500 to $5,000
Description: This penalty is assessed if a merchant facilitates a charge using transaction data that was not directly provided by an Amex card member. American Express will issue a warning before sending a final notice, date for correction, and a fee that’s based on the merchant’s gross Amex transaction volume in a rolling 12-month period.
Amex Data Incident Non-Compliant Fee
Amount: Up to $100,000 per incident
Description: A penalty is assessed by Amex if the merchant is responsible for compromising data and does not take the appropriate steps when it comes to storing and transmitting cardholder data. If a data incident occurs, merchants must notify American Express within 72 hours of discovering the incident.
Amex Targeted Analysis Program (TAP) Fees
Amex TAP Fees are imposed if Amex believes a breach or data leak is linked to a particular business. If you receive a notice from American Express about a potential cardholder data compromise, it’s your responsibility to assess and remediate those security gaps within a reasonable timeline to avoid penalties.
Examples of potential compromises may include:
- Cardholder data found on the internet that’s linked to transactions made at one business.
- Malware is suspected on software that a business is using to process transactions.
- Multiple Amex cardholders report fraudulent transactions on their accounts after making purchases at one business (known as a common point of purchase).
American Express TAP Non-Compliance Fees
Amex may continue to apply non-compliance fees each month until the TAP obligations have been met or resolved, even if 120 days have passed. Amex also has the right to cumulatively impose non-compliance fees, withhold payments, and terminate your merchant agreement if the situation has not been resolved.
Amex Non-Validation Fee
American Express requires certain merchants to demonstrate PCI compliance on a quarterly or annual basis. If the merchant fails to fulfill these requirements or does not provide the validation documents requested by the deadline, a non-validation fee will be assessed at a rate outlined in the table below:
American Express Non-Validation Fee
Non-validation fees can be imposed cumulatively, and American Express has the right to terminate your merchant agreement if validation documents are not received within 90 days of the first deadline.