Consumers Skeptical of Durbin Benefit Posted by AVCU on 1:07 PM

A study by Javelin Research shows that most consumers don't expect to benefit from the pending Durbin debit interchange regulation. Some 66% of consumers reportedly believe that merchants won't lower prices if/when the fees they pay to accept debit cards are lowered. Only 13% think merchants will lower prices overall, and 12% think prices will be lower on items paid with debit cards only.

Consumers also expressed what it would take to get them to switch forms of payment. Forty-seven percent say that no discount below 10% would persuade them to switch to another card, cash, etc.  So, Javelin claims, it might not be worth it for a merchant to try to persuade customers to use something other than the payment form they present. There's one exception, however. That's big merchants being able to recover costs on small discounts because of their ability to spread them over large volumes.

When asked about new debit card fees that may be introduced by card issuers, 60% said that ANY monthly debit fee would make them change to another form of payment. Fifteen percent would change even if the monthly debit fee were as low as $2 or less per month. As Javelin points out, consumers have become used to free checking and encouraged to use debit cards. Hence the negative reaction when there's a big shift to fees for what was free.