Short answer for the Visa Mastercard settlement small business question: nothing has changed on your statement yet. A federal judge granted preliminary approval on June 9, 2026, to a Visa and Mastercard settlement that would eventually cut interchange rates and give merchants more control over which cards they surcharge. Preliminary approval is not final approval, and the court has now set a final hearing date of November 16, 2026.
Here is what the settlement actually contains, what is still pending, and the one thing worth doing now regardless of how the final hearing goes.
What is the Visa-Mastercard settlement
The settlement is part of In re Payment Card Interchange Fee and Merchant Discount Antitrust Litigation, a case that has run in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York since 2005 under docket 1:05-md-01720, in front of Judge Brian M. Cogan. The piece making news in 2026, sometimes called the interchange settlement or the swipe fee settlement, is the equitable relief settlement, the part of the case about the rules merchants operate under going forward, not a cash payout. Reporting on the settlement describes it as a $38 billion deal, and Class Counsel filed the current, amended version of it for preliminary approval earlier this year.
On June 9, 2026, the court granted preliminary approval. That is a procedural step, it lets the settlement administrator notify the class and start the objection clock, and it is the step every news outlet covered that week. It is not the same thing as final approval, and the settlement terms described below do not take effect yet.
Is the settlement final? What happens next
Not yet, and the court has now put dates on what is left. Under the scheduling order the judge entered June 15, 2026, motions for final settlement approval were due within 30 days of that order, objections are due 60 days after that, and reply papers follow 30 days after the objection deadline. The court has set a final approval hearing for November 16, 2026, at 11:00 a.m., in the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn. That hearing is the earliest point final approval could realistically happen, and even a final approval order can be appealed, which would push real-world effect further out. Analysts covering the case have generally penciled in late 2026 or early 2027 before merchants see anything change, and the court's own calendar now backs that timeline up.
Until a final approval order is entered and any waiting period in that order passes, treat every number below as what is proposed, not what is current.
Not every merchant is on board
The court held an objection hearing on April 27, 2026, where counsel for several large retailers, reported to include Walmart, argued the deal does not go far enough. Preliminary approval was granted anyway, but the objection window that runs through the fall means the terms could still be narrowed, and a contested final approval hearing is not a rubber stamp. If you are a small or mid-size merchant, none of that changes what you should do today, which is baseline your own numbers rather than wait on a fight between the networks and the big-box chains.
What changes for small businesses, once it is final
Reporting on the settlement's terms centers on a few provisions that matter to a merchant more than a cardholder:
- A roughly 10 basis point cut to the average effective credit interchange rate, reported to run for five years from the effective date.
- A 1.25% rate cap on standard consumer credit interchange, reported to run for eight years.
- New surcharge and acceptance flexibility, letting merchants set surcharges by card category or brand rather than an all-or-nothing surcharge, within the existing network caps discussed in our surcharge laws by state guide.
- Merchant buying groups, with reporting describing a requirement that Visa and Mastercard drop restrictions on merchants negotiating interchange terms collectively, on a timeline tied to final approval.
None of this is in your processor's control today. It becomes real on whatever timeline the final order sets, not on June 9, and not on the date a news article ran.
What a 10 basis point cut actually looks like
Ten basis points sounds small because it is small. On $40,000 in monthly card sales, a full 10 basis point reduction is about $40 a month, roughly $480 a year, assuming every cent of the cut reaches your statement. That is the entire reason this article exists: the interchange rate is not what determines your bill, your processor's markup on top of it is, and a rate cut at the network level only helps you if your pricing model passes it through.
Why the interchange cut might not touch your rate at all
This is the part most coverage of the settlement skips. Whether you see any benefit from a future interchange cut depends entirely on how your processor prices you today:
- Interchange-plus pricing passes interchange through directly, so a network-level cut should show up on your statement as a lower cost, with the processor's markup unchanged. See how that model works in our interchange-plus explainer.
- Flat-rate and tiered pricing blend interchange into a single quoted rate that the processor sets. A cut to the underlying interchange rate does not obligate a flat-rate processor to pass anything through, and most will not without you asking.
- Cash Discount pricing sidesteps the question for card-paying customers, since the discount offsets the cost structurally rather than chasing basis points. It stays the more predictable model regardless of how the settlement lands.
For more on how interchange, assessments, and markup combine into your rate, see credit card processing fees, explained.
What to do right now
- Baseline your effective rate today, before any settlement term takes effect. You cannot verify a future pass-through if you do not know your current number.
- Do not change your surcharge program based on this news. The surcharge and acceptance flexibility described above is not in effect. Keep following the state and network rules that apply to you today.
- Watch for the final approval hearing, currently set for November 16, 2026, and treat any pricing change your processor makes before a final order as unrelated to this case, not required by it.
Do not confuse this with the 2019 settlement
The same MDL case produced an earlier, separate settlement that reached final approval years ago and is still distributing money to merchants who filed claims for card transactions between 2004 and 2019. If you have seen a claim deadline, a payout letter, or a "where's my check" complaint about this litigation, that is the older, already-final damages settlement, on a different docket track with a different claims administrator. It has nothing left to decide. The 2026 settlement covered in this article is the separate, forward-looking piece of the case, still pending, still changing nothing on your statement until a final order says otherwise.
Frequently asked questions
Is the Visa Mastercard settlement final?
No. A federal judge granted preliminary approval on June 9, 2026. That starts the notice and objection process, it does not make the settlement final. The court has scheduled a final approval hearing for November 16, 2026, and even after that, an objector could appeal. Nothing in the settlement changes what you pay or what you can charge customers until final approval is granted and any waiting period passes.
How much will interchange go down?
Reported terms describe a roughly 10 basis point reduction in the average effective credit interchange rate for five years, plus a 1.25% rate cap on standard consumer credit cards for eight years, once the settlement is final. Ten basis points is small in isolation, on $40,000 in monthly card sales it works out to about $40 a month if every dollar of the cut reaches you, and only your processor's pricing model determines whether it does.
Is this the same as the 2019 Visa Mastercard settlement?
No, and mixing the two up costs merchants time. The 2019 case was a damages settlement, it reached final approval years ago and is still paying out claims on a separate track. The 2026 settlement is a different piece of the same long-running case, covering rules going forward rather than a payout, and it is still at the preliminary approval stage.
Settlement terms can change between preliminary approval, final approval, and any appeal, and this article is not legal advice. Confirm the current status at the final approval hearing date above before you rely on any figure in it, and talk to your own counsel about how the settlement applies to your business.
The one move that pays off regardless of how the settlement lands is knowing your real effective rate today. Get a free rate review and we will show you what you are actually paying, and whether your processor already passes interchange through or not.
Related reading: Credit card surcharge laws by state · Credit card processing fees, explained