The RBA left one kind of card alone on 1 October. Most business owners don't know which.
Thursday 1 October 2026 is the day the RBA cuts the consumer credit card interchange cap from 0.8% to 0.3%. The cap on commercial credit cards stays at 0.8%.
Do you know which one you're holding?
What changes on Thursday
From 1 October, the RBA lowers the cap on consumer credit card interchange from 0.8% to 0.3%. It is also removing surcharging on eftpos, Mastercard and Visa cards.
Interchange is the fee that moves between banks every time a card is tapped. It is the money that has quietly paid for your points.
When the fee falls, the room to pay for points falls with it. Banks told the RBA they would respond with higher card fees and lower earn rates.
Where business cards sit
That's straight from the RBA's own Conclusions Paper. Policy 2 and Policy 3 sit side by side in its summary table. One cuts the cap. The other leaves it exactly where it was.
The RBA kept the cap on commercial credit cards at 0.8% and abolished the 0.5% benchmark. Its paper says part of the reason was to help smaller and non bank issuers keep competing with the big banks and American Express.
That does not make your points safe. It means the rule that hit consumer cards did not hit commercial ones. What each issuer does next is their decision.
So which of your cards does your bank class as commercial? Not the name on the front. The product terms will tell you.
I recently worked with a client putting around $200,000 a month of business expenses through a personal Mastercard earning 0.67 points per dollar. Then his bank told him that, because of the RBA changes, the rate was dropping to 0.5 points per dollar.
Instead of accepting the cut, we moved his spend to the right business card, an Amex Business Platinum. His earn rate went from 0.67 to 1.125 points per dollar. So rather than falling to 0.5, he’s now earning more than double that on every dollar that goes out.
What the banks have already done
The card market has started moving before the deadline. ANZ cut the headline sign up bonuses on its Qantas cards. Westpac adds a rewards program fee from 30 September. NAB changes how its cards earn from 1 October.
American Express is not bound by the Visa and Mastercard caps. As of 27 September it had announced no changes to card earn rates, according to Point Hacks. That can change.
What to do this week
Read every notice your issuers send. Some of these changes land on 30 September and 1 October, and the notices are easy to miss.
Check the product terms on each card you use for business, and find out whether your bank classes it as consumer or commercial.
Don't apply for a card just because a sign up bonus is about to disappear. Do your own research first. This is general information, not financial advice.
The Mental Model
Points are paid for by the fee on the swipe.
When the fee moves, the points move.
So the first question is never how many points a card earns. It is who pays for them.
If this changes how you think about card points, you can follow Turn Left For Less on YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn for ongoing insights into premium travel strategy, or check out us here.
Only move if the card works for your business anyway. Let the points be the bonus, never the reason.
Please note: Turn Left For Less is not a financial adviser and holds no AFSL or ACL, so this is points strategy, not personal financial, legal or insurance advice. Any bonus points, offers or program changes mentioned are an incentive only and say nothing about whether a product, card or policy actually suits you, so always do your own due diligence, or speak to a licensed adviser, before switching, signing up or making any changes. If you're on a legacy, grandfathered, or otherwise sensitive arrangement, don't change it just for points. What you'd lose can easily outweigh the offer. And never chase points for their own sake. Only act when it's something you'd do anyway, run the numbers on the product or decision first, and let the points be the bonus, never the reason.
