The economy may be in need of festive cheer but the Reserve Bank board is not expected to lower the cash rate from its current record low 0.75 per cent until after the holiday season. The Reserve Bank board is expected to hold the cash rate at a record low 0.75 per cent this week […]
The use of digital currency for payments “remains relatively limited” while cash will continue to play an important role in society despite it’s declining use, the Reserve Bank of Australia told the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Tax and Revenue. In a statement delivered to the Committee, in relations to its inquiry into Taxpayer Engagement […]
All businesses across Australia are now banned from hitting customers with excessive surcharges for using certain types of EFTPOS, Mastercard, Visa and American Express cards to make payments. The excessive surcharging ban has applied to large businesses since September last year and now extends to all businesses that are either based in Australia or use […]
There has been a lot of talk about changes to credit card rewards programs in 2017. You might even have received a notification from your bank recently about how your rewards program is about to change. This is because of new interchange fee regulations that rolled out from 1 July 2017. In 2016, the Reserve […]
Australians will feel the impact of the upcoming new credit card interchange regulations — we’re a nation of points junkies with 11 million Qantas Frequent Flyers * alone. But while everyone’s thinking about how the reverberations of these changes affect consumers, it’s easy to forget that new interchange rates raise a number of big questions […]
New card payment regulations, which commence mid-year, could impact how SMEs conduct business but a majority have a limited understanding of the changes, American Express has warned. Card payment regulations announced by the Reserve Bank of Australia last year are due to come into force from July and will cap the fee that Visa, MasterCard and bank-issued American Express […]
Approximately 37,700 more Australians entered the Labour Force in March, decreasing the nation’s estimated seasonally adjusted unemployment rate to 6.1 per cent.
Australia’s unemployment level has jumped to its highest point in twelve years, climbing another 0.3 per cent from December’s employment rate.
The Reserve Bank has again left the official cash rate on hold at 3.5 percent, citing on trend inflation and growth as well as a rise in the number of businesses applying for credit.
When the Reserve Bank cut interest rates, home owners arm-wrestled the banks into passing on the cut. But, as Rohan Gamble finds, small businesses aren’t as lucky:
“Small businesses aren’t just missing out on full rate cuts, business lenders are taking almost double the amount of time to implement the rate reductions.”
