From Monday, vehicle owners using cards to purchase fuel will face difficulty as petrol pumps have stopped accepting payments through credit and debit cards since the banks have levied 1 per cent charge for every sale. “In view of the debit of MDR of 1% it has been decided to stop accepting payment through Credit/Debit Cards from 9th January 2017,” said President of All India Petroleum Dealers Association, in a statement.
Generally ‘Merchant Discount Rate’ the average merchant discount rate is between 1-3%.
Earlier last month, the government had announced .75 per cent discount on purchase of fuel through card.
He added that since their profit margin is fixed on a per KL (per kilolitre) basis, they could not bear additional charges levied by banks. Our margins are fixed on a per KL basis and do not have any scope to absorb these charges. We have specific mechanisms to compute the margin and these do not have any scope for credit card MDR. This will lead to financial loses to the dealers.
160 Petrol pumps of Ahmedabad and 3000 Petrol pumps of Gujarat will stop accepting cards for purchase of fuel.
