Are 3–4% credit card fees still the norm for government contractors?

I came across an older thread here where someone mentioned 3–4% fees when accepting government purchase cards, and it got me thinking.

In my experience working with government contractors, that range still seems pretty common — but a lot of it isn’t actually coming from the processor’s markup.

Over 20 years ago, Visa and Mastercard created special interchange categories for government and commercial cards Level 3, large ticket, etc.) specifically to reduce costs for vendors — but those rates only apply if transactions are set up and submitted correctly.

I attached an older document from GSA just for context — the rates have changed since then, but it shows how these programs were originally structured and why they exist. Today, when things are set up correctly, we typically see government card transactions come in closer to the low-2% range, with large ticket transactions under 2%.

From what I’ve seen, it usually comes down to how the account is set up and whether the system being used can actually pass the required data.

Curious if anyone here has ever had this broken down for them, or if most of the focus is still just on the overall rate?

Sean-

GSA explanation of Level 3 for vendors (1).pdf