For those hoping that Venmo might be the less expensive non-cash alternative that businesses push people to use and/or customers use to avoid CC surcharges, I have some bad news. Venmo is apparently increasing their fees for "goods and services" transactions enough that they're definitely no longer cheaper than just taking cards:



Unfortunately I don't think this is going to cause businesses to surcharge CC less. In fact, I've already seen several posts on reddit over the past couple of months basically claiming that nearly every restaurant (if not nearly every business) in their area surcharge now. (Example.) All we need now is for a major retailer or two to try (and succeed) at imposing surcharges and that will likely cause the vast majority of the rest of the merchant community to do so in pretty short order.