So, to be clear, the RBA has not eliminated surcharges on credit card transactions - they will just move from an add-on to a subtraction from the price customers pay. It will not save consumers anything. Finance providers will still charge the fee but it goes back to the way it used to be in 2003 - a cost of doing business that is built into the price. There is no prohibition on offering a discount for cash payments.
Johnno
@DjityDjity
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I live on Whadjuk Noongar country(Boorloo/Perth Western Australia). I joined the Freedom from Work Party (retired) in 2019 when I retired from my work as an Anglican priest. I am interested in creation-centred spirituality. I try to be a worthy ally of Australia's first nations people and the LGBTQI+ community. And I am bit of a social justice warrior.
Since the early 1970s all states in Australia enacted legislation declaring that 18 year-olds were adults in all respects of the law. Yet, in 2009, the Rudd Government established Fair Work Australia in which all awards deemed that 18-20 year-old workers could be paid at Junior Rates.
It has taken 50 years now for the industrial relations system to recognize this fact.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-31/fair-work-comission-junior-pay-rates-retail-fast-food/106514948
It has taken 50 years now for the industrial relations system to recognize this fact.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-31/fair-work-comission-junior-pay-rates-retail-fast-food/106514948
Frank’s TingCredit Card surcharges will become a thing of the past soon.
So rather than a surcharge, University of Sydney Business School professor Fei Gao thinks the item itself will now be more expensive.
"The business, they need to survive as well. They can't absorb the fees by themselves, so they will certainly pass it down to the customers," she said.
That bank fee should always have been part of the cost of business reflected in the price of goods and services.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-31/rba-surcharges-debit-credit-new-reforms-october-2026/106500064
Trump says he wants to take Iran's oil. It's not his to take. He has no morals - no scruples. It is not his oil and he cannot have it. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2026/3/30/iran-war-live-worker-killed-in-kuwait-israel-intercepts-drones-from-yemen
Federal Education Minister Jason Clare was also stunned by Professor Cortese's findings.
"It is shocking, but what is also shocking is that you can't break it down, and we should be able to know. We invest a lot of money in our universities," Mr Clare told Four Corners.
I will believe how really shocking it is to Minister Clare when I see a government that gets completely out of the habit of using consultants to do public servant's work.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2026-03-30/university-consultants-fees-uts-kpmg-four-corners/106499192
Earthy in EV heavenWe are at a history symposium in Freo, all about the Catalpa rescuing 6 Fenian convicts from Western Australia in 1876.
I bought a book about it which was signed by the author! Fremantle to Freedom by Peter Murphy and Fred Odea
#historyNerd
Queensland's Cyclone Narelle has become Westetn Australia's Cyclone Narelle. It is raining in Perth for the first time in months. And we are venturing out on an adventure on Public Transport - to Fremantle.
Australia's version of DOGE - the Expenditure Review Committee - is a neo-liberal construct that assumes governments must always be reducing expenditure. Commonly called a Razor Gang, I would like to propose it be renamed The Raiser Gang - with a focus on where govenments could raise taxes and other sources of revenue so that essential services do not need to be cut - always urged to do more with less. WARNING - paywalled article https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/chalmers-razor-gang-eyes-cuts-to-legal-services-for-dv-victims-20260325-p5xom9.html?
Who else feels like Australia's Labor government has lost its moral compass? Can't close down gambling advertising. Can't honour its obligations under the Refugee Convention. Can't condemn the State of Israel for its invasion of a Sovereign neighbour - Lebanon. Condemns peace protesters who act in solidarity with Palestinian people. Can't vote in the affirmative to a UN resolution declaring the slavery of African people as the world's most heinous crime.