How Australian Businesses Take Payments from U.S. Customers

Sell to Americans from Australia for a few months and the pattern shows up on your statement: U.S. orders cost more to process than local ones. Three things drive it.

• Foreign-card fees. Every card belongs to a bank in a particular country, called its issuing country. When a card issued in the U.S. is processed by your acquirer (the bank or company that handles your card sales in Australia), it's a foreign-issued card. Foreign cards carry higher interchange (the fee paid to the cardholder's bank) and extra network charges. The Reserve Bank of Australia says merchant service fees on foreign-issued Visa and Mastercard credit cards have been "between 2.6 and 2.75 per cent" (RBA Conclusions Paper, March 2026). Local cards cost far less.
• More declines. Online and phone orders on foreign cards are more likely to be declined by the cardholder's bank, so some American customers never get through checkout.
• Currency conversion. Charge in AUD and your customer's card converts the price, often with a foreign transaction fee from their bank. Charge in USD and someone still converts it to AUD before it reaches your bank, at a margin.

The key point: the card's country decides the fees, not the currency. Pricing in U.S. dollars feels friendlier to the buyer, but a U.S. card on an Australian account is still a foreign card. For the full fee breakdown, see international card payments for Australian businesses.

A. Keep your Australian merchant facility

No new accounts, no U.S. paperwork. American customers pay on the same account as everyone else. Whether you can show and charge prices in USD depends on your acquirer and checkout, so ask before you build it into your store. Either way, U.S. cards still count as foreign-issued.

Help is coming, but not all of it. From 1 April 2027, the RBA caps interchange on foreign-issued cards used in Australia at 1.0% (RBA media release, 31 March 2026). That's a final decision with a future start date. The cap covers interchange only. Card network fees on foreign cards and any currency conversion margin still sit on top, so U.S. cards will still cost more than local ones.

B. A U.S. merchant account in USD

START can set up a U.S. merchant account for an Australian business, charging and settling in U.S. dollars. American cards then process as domestic U.S. sales, and U.S. orders tend to go through more smoothly. The flip side: any Australian customers paying on that account are now the foreign cards. This setup suits businesses whose buyers are nearly all in the U.S., such as some online stores and software companies.

C. Both: an AUD account and a USD account

For businesses with real sales in both countries, START sets up two merchant accounts: an Australian account in AUD, through an Australian acquiring partner, and a U.S. account in USD. START sets them up and manages them together. It's two accounts, not one account that switches currencies. Each country's cards run through that country's account, so both count as domestic sales, and your checkout sends each order to the right one. The pillar guide compares the setups side by side: Australia only, U.S. only or both.

U.S. banks review a merchant account application much like a loan application, and they usually look for a business they can verify in the U.S. Depending on the bank, that can mean:

• A U.S. business entity, such as an LLC or corporation, sometimes set up as a subsidiary of your Australian company
• An EIN (Employer Identification Number), the U.S. tax ID for a business
• A U.S. bank account, or another USD account the bank accepts, for your deposits
• Identity documents for the owners and directors

Payment platforms publish their own versions of this. Stripe's support page, for example, says a business opening a U.S. Stripe account must be registered in the U.S., and that Stripe verifies the entity's EIN and an owner's SSN or ITIN (U.S. personal tax numbers) (Stripe support, checked September 2026). That's one company's published rule, not the rule for every U.S. account.

Requirements vary by bank and by how your business is set up. Some Australian owners already have a U.S. entity; others would rather not form one. Tell us your structure (where you're registered, your ABN or ACN, and whether you have a U.S. entity, EIN or U.S. bank account) and we'll tell you what applies. For the Australian side, see how to get a merchant facility in Australia. Running both means two applications, one for each account.

A U.S. account is worth it when what you lose on U.S. cards today is more than the second account costs to run. You need three numbers:

1. Your monthly U.S. card sales. Your store or invoicing reports show where customers are; your statement shows foreign-card volume.
2. The fee gap. What a U.S. card costs you now, minus what it would cost as a domestic U.S. sale. It depends on card types, networks and your pricing plan. Your statement shows the first half.
3. The running cost of a U.S. account. Its monthly fees and gateway, a deposit account for USD, and, if you need one, the legal and accounting cost of a U.S. entity.

Illustration only. The table below assumes a fee gap of 1.25 percentage points. That's a round number chosen to show the math, not a rate START or anyone else has quoted:

At the low end, a second account (and a U.S. entity, if you need one) will likely eat the savings. At the high end, the savings can pay for it several times over. The middle depends on your numbers. Keep in mind the gap may narrow after the 1.0% foreign-card cap starts on 1 April 2027, and weigh the costs that don't show up as a fee line:

• Lost orders. Fewer declines on domestic sales means fewer American customers giving up at checkout.
• Conversion. Holding USD lets you pay U.S. suppliers, ads and software in USD instead of converting twice.
• Paperwork. Two statements to reconcile, and possibly U.S. tax filings for a U.S. entity.

Send us a recent statement and a rough split of your Australian and U.S. sales, and we'll tell you whether a U.S. account makes sense yet.

Consultants, agencies, wholesalers and software businesses often bill U.S. clients directly rather than through a checkout. On a START U.S. merchant account, the Authorize.Net gateway (the software that sends card payments to the processor) covers the common cases:

• Invoices and phone orders. The Authorize.Net virtual terminal lets you key in a card payment from a browser, with no card reader.
• Monthly plans and retainers. Automated recurring billing charges the client's card on a schedule you set, in USD.
• Returning clients. Saved card profiles let you charge a repeat client again without asking for the card number each time.

Authorize.Net is the gateway on the U.S. account. Authorize.Net says it needs a merchant account from a U.S. or Canadian provider, so for your AUD account, tell us how you take payments and we'll tell you which gateway fits. Keyed and online payments are card-not-present sales, where fraud and disputes run higher; U.S. billing addresses use ZIP codes, so check your address checks accept them. More in preventing card-not-present fraud.

Settlement is when your card sales are deposited into your bank account. A U.S. merchant account settles in U.S. dollars, so your U.S. sales arrive as USD rather than being converted on every order. Your Australian account settles in AUD to your Australian business bank account.

What happens to the USD next is your call. Some businesses keep it in USD to pay American costs; others move it to Australia on a schedule. When and how to convert is a banking and tax question, so talk to your bank and accountant. Which deposit accounts your U.S. account can pay into depends on the bank behind it, so tell us where you bank and we'll tell you what your setup needs.

No more duty-free small parcels. The U.S. once let most shipments valued at US$800 or less enter without duty (the "de minimis" rule). That treatment has been suspended for goods from all countries, Australia included, since 29 August 2025. Executive Order 14388, signed 20 February 2026, continued the suspension, and as of 28 September 2026 it remains in effect with no end date. Low-value parcels from Australia can now owe U.S. duty, collected in different ways depending on the carrier and postal or courier route.

Decide up front who pays: you, by charging duties at checkout, or your customer, on delivery. Tell buyers before they order. An unexpected duty bill at the door is a common reason for refused parcels and disputed charges. Current rules are on U.S. Customs and Border Protection's de minimis fact sheet; check it and your carrier before you ship.

U.S. sales tax is set state by state, and some states require out-of-state sellers to collect it once sales pass a threshold. Ask a tax advisor who handles U.S. sales.