The state, as a small merchant, charges the customer for card payment commissions

2025-12-16 07:10:15, Ekonomi CNA

The state, as a small merchant, charges the customer for card payment

Last week, the State Cadastral Agency (ASHK) announced the return, after several years, of the online payment service for its services, through the e-Albania portal.

Payment can be made through the virtual POS terminal provided by a commercial bank, with all payment cards (debit or credit), issued by banks and other payment institutions in the country.

However, the provision of this service will be associated with additional costs for citizens. In the official information for users on the e-Albania portal, it is stated that, for payments made by credit/debit card, a commission is applied and collected by the card issuer.

For payments up to 1,800 lek, a commission of 50 lek is applied; while for payments over 1,800 lek, a commission of 3% of the value is applied.

A similar practice applies to other services. For example, in cases where businesses pay by card on e-Albania for the fee for the electronic fiscalization certificate, they must also pay an additional fee of 3% on top of the amount of 4 thousand lek.

Paradoxically, citizens may be charged higher commissions for online payments, compared to what they would pay if they made the payment in cash at the counters of financial institutions.

While for over-the-counter payments, the bank generally charges customers fixed commissions, for online payments in large amounts the cost (3% of the fee) will in most cases be higher.

As a rule, the commissions associated with accepting card payments are charged to the entity that contracts the use of the payment service, i.e., the merchant, or in this case, the public institution. This is why, in general, each of us can pay by card in stores or for online purchases, without additional costs.

But, in some cases, merchants, especially small ones, charge the POS payment commission to the customer. In general, the cost transferred to the customer is in the range of 2.5% to 3%, although according to banking experts, the commission that banks charge to merchants in recent years has decreased below these levels.

In the case of payments in e-Albania, state institutions are behaving similarly to restaurant owners or small sales units.

The Albanian government has announced the objective of a cashless economy by 2030, which aims to shift the majority of payments from physical money to digital channels. The law on “Tax Procedures”, recently amended by the Albanian Parliament, also imposes the obligation to equip businesses (with some exceptions) with POS terminals for electronic payments by 2026.

But, while wanting to promote electronic payments, the state itself imposes additional costs on citizens for these payments.

Furthermore, the Bank of Albania has announced that next year it will adopt the European Commission's directive on "Interchange Fee Regulation", which is expected to bring a significant reduction in the commissions paid by merchants for accepting card payments.

The additional cost burden may discourage citizens from using electronic payment channels and keep them tied to cash payments at bank counters or payment institutions.

In this case, the service fees of the ASHK for actions performed by citizens with it cannot be considered symbolic at all. For example, registering a property purchase and sale contract costs the citizen or entity a fee of 5 thousand lek, while issuing an electronic certificate of ownership costs 3 thousand lek. Registering a mortgage contract for loans up to 10 million lek costs 17 thousand lek, while for loans worth over 10 million lek it costs 30 thousand lek.

Despite the high fees, it seems that state institutions are not at all willing to pay a cost for accepting electronic payments themselves, but want to transfer the bill for the "cashless economy" to the citizen./ Monitor.al