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U.S. consumers may not save money and could wind up paying higher credit-card costs if lawmakers force payment networks including Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. to cut fees charged to merchants, a government watchdog said.
“Identifying such savings would be difficult,” the Government Accountability Office said in a report Thursday. “Consumers also might face higher card-use costs if issuers raised other fees or interest rates to compensate for lost interchange fee income.”
The report may derail efforts to cut “swipe fees” paid by merchants on each transaction. Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Target Corp. are among retailers asking Congress to reduce the fees.
