It was a bang last year when Amazon announced that it would no longer accept Visa credit cards in the UK.

January 19 would have been the deadline.

But two days earlier, the two heavyweights were able to come to an agreement: Visa credit cards will continue to be accepted.

Much more detail was not disclosed in an email sent to all Amazon customers in the UK.

But what was the dispute about?

Franz Nestler

Editor in Business.

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Amazon's reasoning at the time was that the fees for Visa credit cards issued in the UK were too high.

"The cost of accepting credit cards remains a barrier for businesses striving to give their customers the best price," an Amazon spokesman said at the time.

The credit card company wasn't particularly enthusiastic at the time and said it was still working on solutions.

These have now been found.

fee pressure

The dispute revolved around the so-called "interchange fee": a fee that is charged to merchants whenever someone pays with the plastic card and which then goes to the issuing banks. In the European Union, this fee has been capped at a maximum of 0.3 percent. After Brexit, British credit card providers are no longer bound by this rule. Visa has increased this fee up to 1.5 percent, i.e. quintupled. Even then, it was suspected that Amazon's move in the UK was just a negotiation tactic to drive down fees. But it was also a test balloon for the United States market, Barclays analyst Ramsey El-Assal said. Because there the interchange fees are many times higher. In this case, Amazon seems to have prevailed.

This market power of the online retailer can also be seen in another example: you can still not pay with Paypal there - although it is probably the most popular payment service in the world. One reason here is the high fees, but also that Amazon has its own competitor on offer with Amazon Pay.

Around the world, however, Visa and Amazon keep coming into conflict. In some countries there were fees, in Australia and India similar steps as in Great Britain were threatened. The problem with the interchange fee is neither new nor unique - but Visa is affected again and again. In 2014, Walmart in the United States sued Visa's American unit for $5 billion for charging its customers "inexplicably high" fees, later banning Visa cards for six months.

And in Germany?

Similar steps are not to be expected here because of the cap imposed by the European Union.

It goes even further: Not even one online payment method may be discriminated against here, for example by excessive fees.

And Visa and Amazon still work well together: This is how they offer a joint credit card for customers.