On February 25, 1997, the Board of Supervisors authorized County departments to accept credit card payments from the public/customers for the payment of various fines and fees. The authorization provided greater flexibility for the public to pay fees and fines without imposing additional fees. Therefore, departments accepting credit card payments must treat the bank card company fees as a departmental expense. Since these fees are absorbed as a departmental expense, they do not offset revenues.
In November of 2012, Visa, a leading electronic payment company, implemented the Government and Higher Education Payment Program. This program is an expansion of a 2006 pilot program, which authorized tax agencies to pass credit card processing fees to the consumer without violation, by including qualifying “non-taxing” merchants. The Board Order approved by the Board of Supervisors on February 25, 1997 was consistent with the 2006 pilot program since it did not apply to the use of credit cards payments for tax collections. However, with Visa’s Government and Higher Education Payment Program, other County departments that may be qualified as government and higher education merchants, are not authorized to pass service fees to the public/customer under current Board authorization.
The Treasurer-Tax Collector has identified 16 Contra Costa County departments that currently accept credit card payments by the public/customer do not qualify as a tax agency, and therefore must absorb the 2-3% transaction fee. The Treasurer-Tax Collector recently contracted the services of a third-party processor for property tax payments and the vendor is offering to provide web and/or point-of-sale transactions at little or no cost to other County departments and at a reasonable cost to the public/customer. In order for interested departments to accept this offer, credit card payment service fees would be passed on to the public/consumer. Since the February 25, 1997 Board Order does not allow for non-taxing departments to pass the fee on to the public/consumer, they are unable to choose to accept the services proposed by the Treasurer-Tax Collector’s contractor in accordance with the Visa Government and Higher Education Payment Program.
Therefore, the County Administrator is requesting a Finance Committee review of Visa credit card service fee/s as stated in the Government and Higher Education Payment Program, and the applicability and impact of allowing other qualifying and interested County departments to pass payment service fees on to the public/customer.