Credit card surcharge disclosure rules in Canada.

The short answer

Visa and Mastercard rules require disclosure at two points: the point of entry (before the customer commits to a purchase) and the point of sale (before they authorize payment). Receipts have to show the surcharge as a separate, labelled line item — never bundled into a subtotal, tax, or other fee. Customers must always have a no-surcharge alternative — debit, cash, or another payment method — and they must be able to cancel without penalty before authorizing payment. Get those four pieces right and the rest is operational.

Why disclosure is the whole compliance story

Adding a surcharge isn't what gets merchants in trouble. Hiding it is. The networks treat surcharging as a transparent merchant pricing decision — a customer's right to see what they're paying, before they pay, and to choose another method if they don't want to. Every disclosure rule on the books exists to protect that decision.

The four pieces that the rules consistently come back to are: (1) the customer is told about the surcharge before they commit to buying, (2) the customer is shown the exact amount before they authorize payment, (3) the customer has at least one way to pay that doesn't carry a surcharge, and (4) the receipt records what happened. A program that hits all four is compliant. A program that misses any one of them isn't, regardless of what the registration says.

Disclosure point 1 — The point of entry

The point of entry is wherever the customer first encounters the merchant in a way that could lead to a transaction. It's deliberately broad. The networks don't define a single channel — they define the principle: the customer has to know about the surcharge before they make a buying decision. What that looks like in practice depends on the business.

In-person retail and restaurants

For brick-and-mortar businesses, the point of entry is the door, the storefront window, the front of the menu, or the host stand. A clearly visible sign — typically printed at letter or half-letter size, posted at eye level — is the standard. Restaurants often add a line to the menu itself near the bottom. The rule is that the customer should be able to read the disclosure during the normal flow of entering and choosing — not after they've already ordered.

Online and e-commerce

Online merchants disclose the surcharge through a homepage banner, a product page notice, or a callout in the cart before checkout. Some Canadian e-commerce platforms now include a built-in surcharge disclosure module. If yours doesn't, a small line under the cart total — "A 2.4% surcharge applies to credit card payments. Debit, Interac, and EFT are not surcharged." — is the simplest compliant approach.

Service-based, B2B, and invoiced businesses

Contractors, lawyers, accountants, and any business that quotes work before invoicing should disclose the surcharge on the estimate or work order. Most invoicing platforms can be configured to add a standard line — "Credit card payments include a 2.4% surcharge. Cheque, EFT, and debit are not surcharged." — to every quote and invoice. For more on how this plays out in practice, see our professional services surcharging guide and the contractors surcharging guide.

Disclosure point 2 — The point of sale

The point of sale is the moment the customer authorizes payment — the terminal screen, the bill at the end of a meal, the checkout page online. The surcharge amount has to be visible at this point with enough clarity that the customer can choose to back out and pay another way without penalty. This is where most non-compliance happens, because the entry disclosure gets the attention and the transaction disclosure gets skipped.

In-person terminal disclosure

Most modern terminals from Ingenico, Verifone, PAX, Clover, and Square handle this automatically — the surcharge appears on the screen as the customer taps or inserts their card, with a "Continue" or "Cancel" option. Older terminals or non-compliant configurations may print the surcharge only on the receipt, after the transaction. That's not enough. The disclosure has to come before authorization, not after.

Restaurant bill-presenter disclosure

For restaurants where the customer pays via a printed bill rather than at a counter terminal, the bill itself is the point of sale disclosure. The surcharge has to appear on the bill — typically as a line above the total, labelled "Credit card surcharge — 2.4% (if paying by credit)." The reason: the customer is committing to the payment when they hand back the bill with their card, so they need to see what they'll be charged before that moment.

Online checkout disclosure

On a checkout page, the surcharge has to display before the customer enters card details — or, at the latest, before they click the final authorization button. The amount needs to be itemized, not bundled into a "fees" line. Most compliant Canadian checkout pages now show the subtotal, taxes, and surcharge each as a separate row, with the total at the bottom.

"The point of entry tells the customer they might be surcharged. The point of sale tells them they are about to be. Both have to land before the card is authorized — that's the rule, and that's where the chargeback risk lives."

The four receipt rules

Every receipt — paper, email, terminal printout, online order confirmation — has to follow four rules:

1. The surcharge appears as a separate line item. Not bundled into the subtotal, the GST/HST/PST line, the tip, or a generic service fee. A line that reads "Credit card surcharge" or "Card processing fee — 2.4%" is what the rule asks for.
2. The card type is identifiable. The receipt has to make clear that the surcharge was applied to a credit transaction. This is usually handled by the standard receipt format — card type, last four digits — but if your terminal generates custom receipts, the surcharge label needs to be unambiguous about why it was applied.
3. Refunds are itemized proportionally. Partial refund receipts have to show the partial surcharge refund as its own line. If the original purchase had a $4 surcharge and half the order is being refunded, $2 has to come back to the customer as a clearly identified surcharge refund.
4. The receipt is provided. Customers must receive a receipt with every transaction, in whatever format is standard for the channel — printed, emailed, displayed on screen. This isn't a surcharge-specific rule, but the surcharge program depends on it.

If your current POS doesn't print receipts that satisfy all four rules, your configuration is incomplete. Our guide to POS systems and surcharging covers which platforms handle this natively and which need a software update.

Customer rights — what the rules guarantee

Two rights belong to the customer in every surcharge program, regardless of how the merchant set it up:

• The right to a no-surcharge alternative. The customer must always have at least one payment method that doesn't carry a surcharge. In Canada this is almost always debit, Interac, or cash — none of which can be surcharged anyway under federal rules. Some merchants also accept cheque or EFT for B2B transactions. The rule is that the customer never has to pay a surcharge to complete a purchase.
• The right to cancel before authorization. Once the surcharge appears on the terminal screen or checkout page, the customer must be able to back out and pay differently — or walk away — without penalty. The transaction can't be force-completed before the customer agrees.

These rights aren't abstract. They're the practical reason the disclosure rules exist in the first place — disclosure makes the rights exercisable. A customer who only learns about the surcharge after the card has been authorized hasn't been given the right to a no-surcharge alternative. That's the legal exposure.

What can be surcharged — and what can't

The disclosure rules apply only to what's actually surchargeable. To avoid disclosing the wrong thing — or worse, surcharging the wrong card type — keep this list close.

• Can be surcharged: Visa credit, Mastercard credit, American Express (with separate Amex rules), Discover, and other credit card networks.
• Cannot be surcharged in Canada, ever: Visa Debit, Interac debit, Mastercard Debit, prepaid cards of any brand, gift cards.

Surcharging a debit transaction — even by accident, due to a misconfigured terminal — is a federal compliance issue, not just a network rule. The terminal has to distinguish credit from debit automatically before applying the surcharge, every time, without exception.

Provincial consumer protection laws — the second layer

Every province has consumer protection legislation that requires honest, upfront pricing. These laws don't ban surcharging — but they reinforce the disclosure rules already required by the networks. In most cases, compliance with Visa and Mastercard's rules also satisfies provincial requirements, since the network rules are stricter.

The exception is Quebec. Quebec's Consumer Protection Act requires that all mandatory charges be included in the advertised price, which makes adding a surcharge after the displayed price functionally non-compliant. Quebec merchants who want to recover processing fees use a cash discount program instead — the price displayed includes processing, and customers paying by debit or cash receive a discount. See the Quebec province page for the full breakdown.

Other provinces — including Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Newfoundland and Labrador — have no surcharge-specific bans, and following the network disclosure rules is enough to comply provincially.

Suggested signage wording (use as a starting point)

The networks don't mandate a script, only that the disclosure be clear and visible. Plain language tends to land better with customers than legal phrasing. A few wordings that meet the rules and read naturally:

• Door or storefront sign: "A 2.4% surcharge applies to all credit card payments. Debit and cash are not surcharged."
• Restaurant menu line: "A 2.4% surcharge applies to credit card payments. Debit and cash are not surcharged."
• Online checkout banner: "Credit card payments include a 2.4% surcharge. Debit, Interac, and EFT do not."
• Estimate or invoice line: "Credit card payments are subject to a 2.4% surcharge. Cheque, EFT, and debit are not surcharged."
• Terminal screen prompt (most are configurable): "A 2.4% surcharge applies. Continue with credit, or cancel and pay by debit?"

The exact percentage should match what's on file in your Visa and Mastercard registrations and what your terminal is configured to apply. If you registered at 2.0%, the signage says 2.0% — not 2.4%.

What gets merchants flagged for non-compliance

Network audits and chargebacks are the two enforcement mechanisms. The patterns that consistently trigger problems:

• No point-of-entry signage at all. Customer learns about the surcharge only when the receipt prints. This is the most common chargeback trigger.
• Surcharge buried inside taxes or service fees on the receipt. Bundling makes the surcharge look like a hidden charge, even if it's mathematically correct.
• Surcharge applied to debit or Interac transactions. Almost always a terminal misconfiguration. Federal rule, no excuse.
• Surcharge above the merchant's effective discount rate. Even by 0.1%. The cap is enforced, and the network can require refunds.
• No partial-refund handling. A return that doesn't refund the proportional surcharge generates a chargeback nearly every time.
• Inconsistent disclosure across channels. Surcharging in-store but not online, or surcharging at one location but not another, without separate registrations on file. Every surcharging channel has to be on the registration.

Industry-specific disclosure considerations

The general rules apply everywhere, but the operational implementation looks different by industry. A few worth flagging:

• Restaurants — bill-presenter disclosure plus a menu line; terminal screen confirmation when paying tableside.
• Retail — door sign plus terminal-screen disclosure; no menu equivalent, so the storefront has to do the work.
• Dental practices and medical clinics — patient-facing reception sign plus invoice line; treatment plans should include the surcharge note before patients commit.
• Contractors — estimate disclosure plus invoice line; deposit and milestone payments need the surcharge identified at each step.
• Professional services — engagement letter disclosure plus invoice line; recurring billing arrangements need the surcharge confirmed at renewal.

Common questions about disclosure

Where do I have to disclose a credit card surcharge?

Two places. The point of entry — a sign at the door, the front of a menu, the homepage of a website, or the top of a quote — so the customer knows before they commit to a purchase. And the point of sale — the terminal screen, the printed bill, or the checkout page — so the customer sees the surcharge amount before authorizing payment. Both are required.

What does the surcharge have to look like on a receipt?

It has to appear as a separate line item, clearly labelled as a surcharge, on every receipt — paper or email. It cannot be bundled into the subtotal, taxes, gratuity, or any catch-all "service fee." The card type also has to be identified so the customer can verify the surcharge was applied to a credit transaction.

Do I have to use specific wording on my surcharge sign?

No. There is no mandated script. The networks require that the disclosure be clear, conspicuous, and understandable to an average customer before payment. Plain language works best. Most compliant signs include the surcharge percentage, the fact that it applies only to credit cards, and that debit and cash are not surcharged.

What happens if a customer pays a surcharge but the disclosure was missed?

The customer can dispute the surcharge through a chargeback, and the card networks can audit the merchant. Repeated non-compliance can lead to fines passed through the acquirer or revocation of acceptance privileges. The surcharge itself isn't illegal — failing to disclose it is what triggers the consequences.

Do I need to disclose the surcharge differently online versus in-person?

The principle is the same — entry and transaction — but the placement is different. Online, the entry disclosure is usually a banner or notice on the homepage or product page, and the transaction disclosure is on the checkout page before the customer enters card details. The surcharge has to be itemized in the order confirmation and the email receipt.

How do I disclose surcharges on partial refunds?

If the customer returns part of their purchase, the surcharge has to be refunded proportionally and the refunded portion has to appear as a separate line on the refund receipt. The terminal or POS should handle this automatically — if it doesn't, your configuration is incomplete and you're not yet compliant.

Next steps

If you've already registered with Visa and Mastercard but haven't yet finalized your signage, terminal configuration, or receipt format, the disclosure side is where most of the remaining compliance work happens. Walk through the four receipt rules with your processor, confirm the terminal shows the surcharge before authorization, and post your signage at every entry point a customer might use. If any of those four pieces is missing, the program isn't ready to go live.

If you're starting from scratch, our registration guide walks through the full sequence — registration, processor configuration, signage, and go-live — in one timeline.