That '+2% For Card' Sign at the Kedai Is Against the Rules. Here's Why Almost Nobody Enforces It

You've seen the sign. Taped to the till at a kedai runcit, printed on a laminated card at a mamak counter, or just said out loud by the cashier: "kena tambah 2% kalau bayar kad." Pay by card, pay 2% more. Some shops won't let you tap unless you're spending at least RM20 or RM30. A few even run two price tags on the same item, a lower "cash price" and a higher "card price."

In June 2024, a food stall in Melaka got compounded RM200 by the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living (KPDN) for charging customers an extra 1% for paying by QR code. The domestic trade minister at the time, Datuk Armizan Mohd Ali, used the case to publicly warn traders that the law doesn't allow additional charges for cashless payments.

That compound made news mainly because it's rare. Bank Negara Malaysia (BNM) has publicly said, since at least March 2018, that retailers cannot surcharge card payments. Industry groups asked for a dedicated hotline that same year. Eight years later, the "+2% for card" sign is still a fixture of Malaysian retail.

1. Why shops charge extra in the first place

Every time you tap a card, the shop pays a small cut of that transaction to its bank. This is called the Merchant Discount Rate (MDR), and it's how banks and payment networks get paid for running the card system.

MDR isn't one flat number. Debit costs merchants less than credit, and rates are tiered by business size. When the Malaysia Retailers Association and Malaysia Consumer Movement pushed BNM to crack down on surcharging back in 2018, they pointed out some retailers charged a flat 2% "convenience fee" despite an actual MDR as low as 1.5% for credit or 0.5% for debit. The surcharge shops charge you is routinely higher than what they're actually paying the bank.

Mydin's managing director, Ameer Ali Mydin, then a council member of the Malaysia Retailers Association, put it bluntly: slapping a surcharge on an item misleads consumers about the real price. A surcharge dressed up as a "processing fee" often isn't cost recovery, it's a small, uncapped markup the shop pockets.

2. Where the "no surcharge" rule actually comes from

There isn't one standalone Malaysian statute that says "thou shalt not surcharge." Instead, the rule is layered, and runs through the banking system rather than a court.

BNM's Payment Cards Framework, a policy document issued 19 August 2022 with its surcharge and merchant-acceptance provisions effective from 1 January 2023, requires the operators of payment card networks used in Malaysia (Visa, Mastercard, MyDebit and others) to set clear rules for their member banks and merchants on surcharging and minimum transaction amounts, publish those rules, and act against merchants who don't comply. The framework defines a surcharge as any fee a merchant adds on top of the price because you paid by card.

That framework doesn't fine merchants directly. It obliges banks and card networks to police their own merchants, with BNM supervising the banks. That's why a surcharge complaint usually gets pointed toward the acquiring bank rather than a government enforcement unit.

3. Credit cards specifically: Visa and Mastercard's own rulebooks

Sitting underneath BNM's framework, Visa and Mastercard each have their own global merchant rules banning surcharging in most circumstances. These apply to any business that signs up to accept their cards, Malaysia included, and are a big part of why the rule holds even for credit cards, which run on international networks BNM doesn't control the way it controls the domestic MyDebit network.

Malaysian law firm commentary points to real contract language: RHB Bank's merchant terms reportedly forbid levying "a surcharge on a Cardholder... by any increase in price or otherwise," and Maybank's agreement is said to carry a similar restriction. If a shop signs up for a card machine, the no-surcharge clause is usually already sitting in the contract it agreed to.

Worth flagging honestly: Visa's and Mastercard's rulebooks are revised periodically and aren't fully public, so exact clause numbers reported in Malaysian commentary may not reflect current wording. The ban on surcharging has been a consistent feature of both schemes for years, but treat any specific rule number as a snapshot, not a permanent guarantee.

4. Can a shop set a minimum spend for card payments?

No. This is a separate rule from surcharging, and just as firm. Visa's and Mastercard's merchant rules bar a minimum (or maximum) transaction amount as a condition of accepting their cards, meaning a shop that accepts Visa or Mastercard should let you pay RM1 on the card, not just RM20 and above. BNM has made the same point publicly for years.

A "card minimum RM20" sign is exactly the kind of practice consumer groups and BNM have flagged repeatedly, and it's still one of the most commonly reported violations.

The one grey patch: debit cards aren't covered by an explicit published scheme rule on minimums the way Visa and Mastercard credit cards are, though BNM's own framework is understood to extend the same logic to them.

5. The "discount for paying cash" workaround

Here's where things get genuinely murky. BNM's framework lets merchants "steer" customers toward a payment method with a discount or other benefit, while separately banning surcharges outright. On paper, that's two different things, one allowed, one not.

In practice, "5% off if you pay cash" and "5% more if you pay by card" can be the exact same price difference, dressed differently. We couldn't find a published Malaysian ruling that draws a clear line between a legitimate cash discount and a relabelled card surcharge, so businesses nudging customers toward cash generally use the discount framing, the version regulators haven't publicly objected to.

For you as the shopper, the effect is identical either way. The legal exposure for the shop genuinely differs depending on which sign they put up, though.

6. What about DuitNow QR and e-wallets like Touch 'n Go?

DuitNow QR runs on a different rail entirely, a bank-transfer and e-wallet system operated by PayNet, not a Visa, Mastercard or MyDebit card transaction. That matters because BNM's Payment Cards Framework is written specifically for payment cards, so it doesn't automatically extend to QR the same way.

Merchants do pay a small MDR on DuitNow QR too, though most acquirers keep waiving it entirely for micro businesses (roughly under RM300,000 in annual sales, or fewer than 5 staff) and small businesses (up to RM3 million or 30 staff), with PayNet covering part of that cost.

Despite the thinner legal basis, the government's position has been unambiguous. KPDN's June 2024 warning, backed by the RM200 Melaka compound, treated a QR surcharge exactly like a card surcharge: not allowed, though enforced under the Control of Supplies Act 1961 and Price Control and Anti-Profiteering Act 2011, not BNM's card-specific rules.

Keep this separate: Touch 'n Go eWallet has, since April 2024, charged its own users a 1% conversion fee for scanning foreign QR codes overseas. That's a currency-conversion fee on its own customer, not a merchant surcharging you at checkout.

7. Why enforcement is this thin

Three things stack up against you here. First, the mechanism is contractual: BNM's framework binds banks and networks, not merchants directly, so BNM's own leverage over a small kedai is indirect. Second, nobody appears to publish enforcement statistics specific to card surcharging, no visible count of complaints, warnings or terminated facilities, so it's hard to know if this is taken seriously at scale or mostly ignored. Third, KPDN's price-control powers have real teeth, but they've been used against QR surcharges far more visibly than classic card ones.

The honest picture: the rule against card surcharging is clear and has been for years, but enforcement is thin enough that industry groups were still begging for a dedicated hotline in 2018, and the practice never really went away.

8. Can a shop just refuse cash, or refuse cards, entirely?

Yes, and it's a genuinely different question from surcharging. A business is free to be cash-only, cashless-only, or QR-only. KPDN itself has indicated there's no law forcing a business to accept cash.

The no-surcharge rule only bites when a shop accepts a payment method and then penalises you for choosing it, not when it simply declines to offer that method at all. A "cashless only" sign at the door is a different, and generally legal, business decision from a "+2% for card" sign at the till.

Surcharge, minimum spend or cash discount: what's actually allowed

What to actually do

If you've just been surcharged or blocked from paying by card:

• Photograph the receipt (especially if itemised) and any sign advertising the surcharge or minimum spend.
• Note the shop's name, address, and the acquiring bank's name if visible on the terminal or receipt.
• Complain to your card-issuing bank first, they can escalate to the acquiring bank for you.
• Complain to BNMLINK (formerly BNMTELELINK): 1-300-88-5465, the web form on BNM's website, or the BNMLINK app.
• For DuitNow QR or e-wallet surcharges, also flag it to KPDN, the angle they've actually acted on.
• Keep expectations realistic. A complaint won't likely refund what you were overcharged, but can trigger a compliance check.

If you run a shop and are tempted to surcharge:

• Don't. It breaches your merchant agreement and could get your card facility suspended, on top of the reputational hit.
• If MDR eats into thin margins, take that up with your acquiring bank, rather than pushing it onto customers.
• Check whether you qualify as a micro or small business for a DuitNow QR MDR waiver, most acquirers still offer this.
• To encourage cash or QR, frame it as a discount for the cheaper method, not a surcharge for the card.