What is the Mastercard NABU Fee on your merchant statement?

Network pass-through

Who charges it, and is it a pass-through cost or a markup?

Mastercard sets this fee directly, and it's charged on every Mastercard transaction as part of what the network requires for using its infrastructure and brand. Your processor collects and forwards it but has no control over the rate. Like Visa's equivalent network fees, this is a pass-through cost, not a processor markup, and it's identical across every processor that routes a transaction through Mastercard's network.

Where it hides on a statement

Some processors itemize the NABU fee clearly under its own label; others fold it into a combined line labeled simply “network fees” or “other network charges” alongside Visa's equivalent fees, Mastercard's assessment fee, and sometimes even genuinely negotiable processor charges. That bundling makes it harder to verify you're only being charged legitimate network pass-through costs and not something padded in alongside them. If your statement shows one lump network fee figure rather than fees itemized by network and by fee type, that's worth asking your processor to break out specifically. It's a reasonable, ordinary request, since every network publishes its own fee schedule and a processor billing you accurately should be able to show its work without difficulty. A processor that resists a plain request to itemize a bundled line is giving you useful information about how transparent the rest of your pricing probably is too, which is worth paying attention to beyond this one fee.

What it typically costs

As of August 2026, Mastercard's published NABU rate is $0.0195 per domestic transaction, a rate that has held steady since 2013, and $0.0295 per transaction on cards issued outside the US, a separate international rate Mastercard added in 2024. Because it only applies to Mastercard transactions and not Visa, Discover, or American Express, your total exposure to this fee depends on what share of your card sales come through Mastercard specifically.

Can you get rid of it?

No. This is a mandatory network charge for accepting Mastercard, and no processor can waive or discount it, since Mastercard sets the rate itself and it applies uniformly. The only way to reduce your total exposure would be a shift in your customers' card mix, which isn't something a business can meaningfully control or should try to engineer around a fee this small.

What to check on your own statement

1. Confirm this line item is labeled as a Mastercard-specific charge, not a general network fee.
2. Check that it's only applied to your Mastercard transaction volume, not your total card volume.
3. Verify it's listed separately from your processor's own per-transaction markup.
4. Compare the rate across a few months. It should stay consistent since it's centrally set by Mastercard.
5. If you don't see it itemized at all, ask your processor for a fully itemized statement.

Frequently asked questions

What is the Mastercard NABU fee?

Mastercard's Network Access and Brand Usage fee, a per-transaction charge for using Mastercard's network, fixed by Mastercard and identical across all processors.

Is the NABU fee the same as an assessment fee?

They're related but distinct network charges. Both go to Mastercard rather than your processor, but they're calculated and billed as separate line items.

Can I avoid the Mastercard NABU fee?

Not while accepting Mastercard cards. It applies to every Mastercard transaction and is set by Mastercard directly, with no processor discretion.

Does the NABU fee apply to Visa transactions?

No. It's specific to Mastercard. Visa has its own separate set of network fees that apply only to Visa transactions.

Is the NABU fee worth negotiating during a rate review?

Not directly, since it's centrally fixed by Mastercard and no processor has room to discount it. What is worth doing during a rate review is confirming it's itemized clearly and priced at Mastercard's actual published rate rather than padded into a bundled “network fee” line that also happens to include real processor markup. A rate review that only looks at your headline percentage rate and ignores fees like this one misses a meaningful part of your total cost, especially for a business that accepts a lot of Mastercard volume relative to Visa. The useful negotiating conversation isn't about the NABU fee itself, it's about making sure every network fee on your statement is itemized clearly enough that you can tell real pass-through costs apart from anything added on top of them.