A letter to the editor can be a great way to personalize this complicated issue and show how important it is to local merchants. We are encouraging supporters to use the letter below as a template to draft your own letter to the editor to submit to your local paper.
Most newspapers allow you to submit letters online under the “Opinion” tab of their website. It is an easy process—and you could wind up as a published author that makes a huge difference in the fight for swipe fee reform.
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To the Editor:
As a small businessman who works every day to provide a great shopping experience for members of this community, I have a hard time understanding how anyone would consider turning their backs on merchants and our customers by rolling back the swipe fee reforms that a bipartisan Senate passed last year. It’s hard to believe, but the big banks and their corporate lobbyists want Congress to raise credit card fees and get rid of customer discounts.
What the big bankers don’t understand is how crucial this Main Street stimulus really is to my customers and me. Swipe fees cost my business a stunning $XXXX last year alone and every year these fees cost me more. Today it is my second largest annual cost of doing business. What’s worse is these higher fees haven’t resulted in improved service or any other benefits to my business or my customers, just a higher price for the same service.
Swipe fee reform means that small business swipe fees will fall dramatically—giving merchants the opportunity to pass the cost savings along to our customers by offering discounts to those who pay with cash, debit, or check rather than credit. We want to pass savings along to our customers, but the big banks keep trying to make sure we can’t.
Visa, MasterCard, and their banking allies may be big, but merchants and consumers know how important this Main Street stimulus really is, and we’re willing to keep fighting until it happens.