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Visa and Mastercard Changes to Debit Cards: New Procedures Affect Payment Options

07/12/2024 11:09:53 AM

Jul12

When making a donation or paying any of your TBE billing statements, you are able to use either a debit or credit card and are assessed a 3% fee to offset the 3% that TBE is charged for this convenience. Visa and Mastercard recently changed their procedures so that we can no longer make this 3% charge automatic when a debit card is used. Now, it can only be assessed if you agree to accept the 3% charge. This is only for debit cards; credit card payments will continue to be assessed the 3% charge.
Because of this change from the debit card companies, TBE will change our procedures for using debit cards:

• You can continue to use a debit card for all donations under $50 and will be asked to confirm that you agree to pay the 3%. When you make these donations, we will ask you to agree to the 3% charge to offset the 3% TBE has to pay the debit card companies.

• You will no longer be able to use your debit card to pay for your membership contributions, school fees, or building fund donations. This is to prevent TBE from having to pay large fees that aren’t covered with members’ payments, since we can no longer be certain that we will recoup the 3% charge for these larger payments. If you would like to pay these charges from your checking account, we can help you set up payments as an electronic check directly from your checking account. There is only a 1% charge for these transactions.

• If you want to continue to use a debit card to pay for membership contributions and school fees, and agree to pay the 3% fee, you can set up automatic payments with Melissa Osborne. Any automatic payments that are currently set up with debit cards can remain as they are. This change is for any new payments or when setting up automatic payments for your 2025 membership contribution.

Again, this only affects debit cards. The policy for credit cards remains the same. We will remind all members of this change during the membership renewal period later this fall. If you have any questions about this new procedure, please contact Stefanie Kushner at exec@tbemadison.org.

April 30, 2025 2 Iyar 5785