Barclays has been hit with an £8.4 million fine by the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) for ‘failing to comply’ with the Interchange Fee Regulation (IFR).

The PSR said that the bank did not provide retailers with complete information about the costs of card services it supplied, which is required under IFR rules.

Retailers were therefore unable to easily understand the transaction fees associated with accepting certain types of card payments, the PSR said.

The PSR’s investigation revealed that Barclays failed to comply with the IFR for over three years from December 2015 to December 2018. The bank processed a third of all card payment transactions in the UK throughout that time - meaning thousands of retailers and transactions were affected.

Along with the fine, the PSR said it has made sure that the full information required under the IFR is now available to all retailers who use Barclays’ card payment processing services.

“It’s vital that retailers and consumers get value for money on payment services – the interchange fee rules are an important part of making sure this happens,” said Chris Hemsley, managing director of the PSR. “Barclays’ failure to be transparent with retailers about the fees they pay for card services meant retailers could have been missing out on better deals.”

Barclays’ fine marks the second enforcement outcome the PSR has published as a result of its work overseeing the IFR in the UK. Earlier this year, the PSR hit NatWest with a £1.82 million fine for overcharging interchange fees on credit cards.

Barclays was also recently fined £50 million by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for 'reckless' capital raising in 2008. The watchdog found that Barclays failed to inform the market and its shareholders about £322 million of fees paid to certain Qatari investors.

The Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) also recently imposed a $361 million fine on Barclays for charges relating to over-issuance of securities.

The US agency found that as a result of the failure, Barclays offered and sold around $17.7 billion of securities in unregistered transactions.

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