2022-05-04 Laura Karet.Credit Card Competition Act

Refer To：《Excessive Swipe Fees and Barriers to Competition in the Credit and Debit Card Systems》。

Chairman Durbin, Ranking Member Grassley, and Members of the Committee:

主席德宾、资深成员格拉斯利和委员会成员：

I am Laura Karet, CEO, President and Executive Chair of Giant Eagle, Inc., one of the nation's largest multi-format food, fuel and convenience retailers with approximately 34,500 team members operating more than 470 corporate and independently owned and operated store locations throughout western Pennsylvania, Ohio, north central West Virginia, western Maryland, and Indiana. On April 22, 2022, with no negotiation or threat of competition constraining them, Visa and Mastercard imposed a fee increase that will cost Giant Eagle $1.3 million annually. I appreciate the opportunity to talk to you about the impact of swipe fees on our business today.

我是劳拉·卡雷特，Giant Eagle, Inc.的首席执行官、总裁和执行主席，该公司是美国最大的多格式食品、燃料和便利零售商之一，拥有大约 34,500 名团队成员，在宾夕法尼亚州西部、俄亥俄州、西弗吉尼亚州中北部、马里兰州西部和印第安纳州经营着 470 多个公司和独立拥有和运营的商店。2022 年 4 月 22 日，在没有谈判或竞争威胁的情况下，Visa 和万事达卡实施了费用上涨，这将使 Giant Eagle 每年损失 130 万美元。我很高兴有机会与您讨论刷卡费对我们业务的影响。

Our company was established in 1931 by five founders determined to build better lives for their families and communities – a cause we continue to embrace.

我们公司由五位创始人于 1931 年成立，他们决心为家庭和社区创造更美好的生活——这是我们继续坚持的事业。

Our purpose is to provide communities with life’s essentials, so our neighbors have the opportunity to thrive. This purpose and our guiding principles of “Purpose Beyond Profit” have obviously been an extremely important driver for us throughout the past two years of the pandemic. I am so proud of all that our team has accomplished both in ensuring that food and household supplies were accessible to families during this challenging time, and also in administering COVID vaccinations and providing critical pharmacy supplies. We were one of the first pharmacies authorized to provide COVID vaccinations to our rural communities – a role we continue to play with boosters today.

我们的目标是为社区提供生活必需品，让我们的邻居有机会茁壮成长。这个目标以及我们的“超越利润的目标”指导原则显然在过去两年的疫情中一直是我们极其重要的驱动力。我为我们的团队在确保食品和家庭用品在这一挑战时期可供家庭使用，以及在管理 COVID 疫苗接种和提供关键药品供应方面所取得的成就感到非常自豪。我们是首批被授权为农村社区提供 COVID 疫苗接种的药房之一——这一角色我们今天仍在通过加强针继续扮演。

I am also proud to serve as Vice Chair of FMI, the Food Industry Association. FMI works with and on behalf of the entire food industry to advance a safer, healthier, and more efficient consumer food supply chain. FMI brings together a wide range of members across the value chain — from retailers who sell to consumers, to producers who supply the food, to a wide variety of companies providing critical services —to amplify the collective work of the industry.

我也很自豪能担任食品行业协会（FMI）的副主席。FMI 与整个食品行业合作并代表其工作，以推动更安全、更健康、更高效的消费者食品供应链。FMI 汇集了价值链中广泛的成员——从向消费者销售的零售商，到供应食品的生产商，再到提供关键服务的各种公司——以增强行业的集体工作。

FMI’s membership includes nearly 1,000 supermarket member companies that collectively operate almost 33,000 food retail outlets and employ approximately 6 million workers. Our industry historically operates on razor thin margins of just 1-2%. We operate in a highly competitive market, and as inflation has driven prices higher, our customers have become even more conscious of how they are spending their money, driving down profit.

FMI 的会员包括近 1,000 家超市会员公司，这些公司共同运营近 33,000 家食品零售店，并雇佣大约 600 万名员工。我们的行业历来以仅 1-2% 的微薄利润率运营。我们在一个竞争激烈的市场中运营，由于通货膨胀推高了价格，我们的客户对如何花钱变得更加谨慎，从而降低了利润。

During COVID, we invested in safety protocols, increased employee salaries and benefits, and other measures to ensure our industry was able to keep our doors open and serve our customers safely.

在新冠疫情期间，我们投资了安全协议，增加了员工的薪资和福利，以及其他措施，以确保我们的行业能够保持营业并安全地为客户服务。

In total, food retailers invested more than $24 billion, in the first year of the pandemic alone, on additional pandemic-related expenses, including:

总的来说，仅在大流行的第一年，食品零售商就在额外的大流行相关费用上投资了超过 240 亿美元，包括：

• $12 billion in increased payroll and incentive pay;

•120 亿美元的工资和激励薪酬增加；

• $5 billion in increased employee benefits;

•增加 50 亿美元的员工福利；

• $1 billion in non-monetary benefits and vaccine incentives;

•价值 10 亿美元的非货币福利和疫苗激励；

• $1 billion in personal protective equipment and other pandemic supplies;

10 亿美元的个人防护装备和其他疫情物资；

• $3 billion in cleaning and sanitation supplies and labor; and

用于清洁和卫生用品及劳动力的 30 亿美元；以及

• $1.5 billion in technology and online delivery expenses.

15 亿美元用于技术和在线交付费用。

There are three points that I want to address today.

今天我想要讨论三个要点。

First, Giant Eagle’s swipe fees have materially increased over time, and the April 22nd unilateral increase will only exacerbate the problem.

首先，Giant Eagle 的刷卡费随着时间的推移大幅增加，而 4 月 22 日的单方面增加只会加剧这一问题。

Visa and Mastercard together control 85% of the market. On April 22, 2022, both Visa and Mastercard increased the fees retailers pay, and they also created new categories of fees. Every bank that issues credit and debit cards adopted these fee increases without deviation or exception. In my estimation, this cannot possibly comply with either the letter or the spirit of our nation’s antitrust laws.

Visa 和 Mastercard 共同控制了 85%的市场。2022 年 4 月 22 日，Visa 和 Mastercard 都提高了零售商支付的费用，并且还创建了新的费用类别。每家发行信用卡和借记卡的银行都毫无例外地采用了这些费用增加。在我看来，这不可能符合我们国家反垄断法的字面或精神。

This latest price increase fits the pattern we have seen for years. Giant Eagle has been paying higher and higher payment fee costs. Electronic tender sales –which includes credit, debit, open loop gift cards, SNAP, fleet cards, and various online and emerging tender types sales currently make up around 82% of sales transactions for Giant Eagle. Of the 82% that are electronic tender, about 37% of the total sales are Visa and Mastercard, but when you look at the total card processing fees, Visa and Mastercard make up over 62% of those fees.

最新的价格上涨符合我们多年来看到的模式。Giant Eagle 一直在支付越来越高的支付费用。电子支付销售——包括信用卡、借记卡、开放式礼品卡、SNAP、车队卡以及各种在线和新兴支付类型的销售，目前约占 Giant Eagle 销售交易的 82%。在 82%的电子支付中，大约 37%的总销售额是 Visa 和万事达卡，但当你查看总的卡处理费用时，Visa 和万事达卡占这些费用的 62%以上。

Over the past 4 years, our Visa and Mastercard fees have grown from 57% of our total fees to 62% of our total fees, while, at the same time, Visa and Mastercard sales as a percent of total sales have declined about 2%.

在过去的四年中，我们的 Visa 和 Mastercard 费用从占总费用的 57%增长到占总费用的 62%，同时，Visa 和 Mastercard 销售额占总销售额的比例下降了约 2%。

Visa and Mastercard used the pandemic as an opportunity to effectively increase swipe fees. While Giant Eagle went to great lengths to insure that our customers and employees were safe by providing curbside pickup and online ordering, Visa and Mastercard used this shift in shopping behavior to charge us a higher “card not present” rate for these services. This alone effectively increased the swipe fees that Giant Eagle paid.

Visa 和 Mastercard 利用疫情作为机会有效地提高了刷卡费。虽然 Giant Eagle 竭尽全力通过提供路边取货和在线订购来确保我们的顾客和员工的安全，但 Visa 和 Mastercard 利用这种购物行为的转变向我们收取更高的“无卡”费率。这一举措单独就有效地增加了 Giant Eagle 支付的刷卡费。

很多企业在疫情中快速成长。

The other members of our industry also witnessed an explosion in the growth of online sales, which are principally limited to credit or debit cards, in part due to Visa and Mastercard’s efforts to insure that their cards were essentially the only form of payment that could be used for such transactions. Even before the pandemic, FMI research shows card transactions accounted for nearly 80% of grocery sales across the industry. The rise in card payments due to the pandemic remains elevated to this day, meaning the cost of swipe fees on grocery stores is higher than ever before.

我们行业的其他成员也见证了在线销售的爆炸性增长，这主要限于信用卡或借记卡，部分原因是 Visa 和 Mastercard 努力确保他们的卡基本上是此类交易中唯一可以使用的支付方式。即使在疫情之前，FMI 的研究显示，卡交易占整个行业杂货销售的近 80%。由于疫情导致的卡支付增加至今仍然居高不下，这意味着杂货店的刷卡费成本比以往任何时候都高。

In stark contrast, during the pandemic, my company and others like it were authorized by USDA to accept online payments from our customers using the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance (SNAP) EBT cards. This allowed families using SNAP benefits to purchase groceries online. This online SNAP EBT card has been a lifesaver for some of our customers, especially during the most challenging days of the pandemic when customers were advised to remain in their homes. It is interesting to note that those SNAP electronic transactions are completed securely, without Visa or Mastercard, and without incurring any swipe fees.

相比之下，在疫情期间，我的公司和其他类似公司被美国农业部授权接受客户使用补充营养援助计划（SNAP）EBT 卡进行在线支付。这使得使用 SNAP 福利的家庭可以在线购买杂货。这在线 SNAP EBT 卡对我们的一些客户来说是救命稻草，尤其是在疫情最艰难的日子里，当时建议客户留在家中。值得注意的是，这些 SNAP 电子交易是在没有 Visa 或 Mastercard 的情况下安全完成的，并且没有产生任何刷卡费用。

It is hard for us to understand why SNAP EBT cards could accommodate the changes necessitated by the pandemic, but Visa and Mastercard used it as an avenue to increase prices.

我们很难理解为什么 SNAP EBT 卡能够适应疫情带来的变化，而 Visa 和 Mastercard 却利用这一途径来提高价格。

Second, millions of customers suffer when swipe fees increase.

其次，当刷卡费增加时，数百万客户会受到影响。

Because of the unilateral fee increases, Visa and Mastercard announced on April 22nd, my company and my customers will be paying an additional $1.3 million just to use their cards. This fee increase came on the heels of Visa reporting in its March 22, 2022 quarterly financials that its profit was just above 50%.

由于 Visa 和 Mastercard 在 4 月 22 日宣布的单方面费用增加，我的公司和客户将额外支付 130 万美元仅用于使用他们的卡。这次费用增加紧随 Visa 在 2022 年 3 月 22 日的季度财务报告中披露其利润刚刚超过 50%之后。

I was truly shocked to hear the remarks made by Vasant Prabhu, CFO of Visa, on the company’s April 26 earnings call: “And then, the last thing I’d say, net-net, historically, inflation has been positive for us.” Inflation is not and should not be a positive. We in the food industry are working every day to reduce its impact. I know this Congress, the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve and the White House also are focused on policies intended to reduce inflation. A business that benefits from price increases is not facing any competition, in my estimation, and clearly is not at all concerned about announcing that fact publicly.

我听到 Visa 首席财务官 Vasant Prabhu 在公司 4 月 26 日的财报电话会议上发表的言论时，感到非常震惊：“然后，我要说的最后一件事是，总的来说，历史上，通货膨胀对我们是有利的。”通货膨胀不是也不应该是积极的。我们食品行业每天都在努力减少其影响。我知道国会、联邦储备委员会和白宫也专注于旨在降低通货膨胀的政策。在我看来，一个从价格上涨中获益的企业没有面临任何竞争，显然也完全不担心公开宣布这一事实。

Third, there must be competition in the debit and credit card market.

第三，借记卡和信用卡市场必须有竞争。

Visa and Mastercard are the only vendors that Giant Eagle cannot negotiate with. When Giant Eagle buys ketchup or paper towels, it suppliers compete to give Giant Eagle the best price. Ultimately, our customers benefit from a competitive market.

Visa 和 Mastercard 是 Giant Eagle 无法谈判的唯一供应商。当 Giant Eagle 购买番茄酱或纸巾时，其供应商会竞争以提供给 Giant Eagle 最优惠的价格。最终，我们的客户从竞争激烈的市场中受益。

In contrast, Visa and Mastercard do not compete for merchant business. I believe companies should be able to charge competitive prices for the goods and/or services they offer, but, from my experience, there is nothing competitive about two companies collectively setting fees that are then charged uniformly by every bank in the country at a rate that ends up exceeding all our business expenses, other than the salaries of our associates and rent.

相比之下，Visa 和 Mastercard 并不争夺商户业务。我相信公司应该能够为其提供的商品和/或服务收取具有竞争力的价格，但根据我的经验，两家公司共同设定费用，然后由全国每家银行统一收取的做法没有任何竞争性，最终这些费用超过了我们所有的业务开支，除了员工的工资和租金。

Our customers want to have the convenience of using these cards, and so merchants must pay what Visa and Mastercard set as the so-called default interchange rates. Yet, the fees associated with accepting any type of payment for a particular good should be incidental to the transaction, and certainly should not be among the highest expenses, third only to labor and rent, business owners should face.

我们的客户希望使用这些卡的便利，因此商家必须支付 Visa 和 Mastercard 设定的所谓默认交换费率。然而，与接受特定商品的任何类型付款相关的费用应该是交易的附带费用，当然不应该是仅次于劳动力和租金的最高费用之一，这是企业主应该面对的。

In summary, the three points that I want to leave you with are: (1) Giant Eagle’s swipe fees have materially increased over time, and the April 22nd unilateral increase will only exacerbate the problem; (2) millions of customers suffer when swipe fees increase; (3) there must be competition in the debit and credit card market.

总之，我想留给你们的三点是：（1）Giant Eagle 的刷卡费随着时间的推移大幅增加，4 月 22 日的单方面增加只会加剧问题；（2）当刷卡费增加时，数百万客户会受到影响；（3）借记卡和信用卡市场必须有竞争。

I applaud this Committee for looking at ways to achieve robust competition in the use of credit and debit cards, similar to the robust competition we must take part in if we are to remain in business in the grocery industry, and I would be pleased to answer your questions.

我赞扬该委员会寻找在使用信用卡和借记卡方面实现强有力竞争的方法，类似于我们在杂货行业中为了保持业务必须参与的强有力竞争，我很乐意回答你们的问题。

2022-05-04 Laura Karet.Credit Card Competition Act

2022-05-04 Laura Karet.Credit Card Competition Act

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