CAMP HILL, Pa. -- Sen. Arlen Specter, ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, stopped by a Giant Food supermarket in Camp Hill, Pennsylvania, yesterday to talk with shoppers and Giant CEO Carl Schlicker about the impact of hidden credit card “interchange” fees. The visit was sponsored by the Merchants Payments Coalition (MPC), an organization of retailers fighting for a more competitive and transparent system of credit card fees that NACS helped cofound.

Last year Sen. Specter held a hearing on interchange fees and found what he later called a “disturbing pattern of anticompetitive conduct by credit card companies.”

“Sen. Specter continues to probe the broken market of interchange fees. NACS, along with the other members of the MPC, applaud his tenacity and urge Congress to act in a bipartisan way in cracking the code on these hidden, outrageous fees that all consumers wind up paying,” said Lyle Beckwith, NACS senior vice president of government relations.

“We’re pleased that Sen. Specter is taking time to look at this problem first hand and talk directly with the people who have to pay the bill,” John Motley, senior vice president of government and public affairs for the Food Marketing Institute (FMI), said in a press release. FMI is also an MPC member.

“Interchange fees are like a hidden tax that we all have to pay whether or not we use credit and debit cards,” said Motley. “We hope Sen. Specter and his colleagues will keep up the pressure on the big credit-card companies and force them to do the right thing for retailers and consumers.”