Late payment fees on credit cards need to be more no more than NZ$15, the Commerce Commission advised banks and credit card issuers in New Zealand. ComCom made its view - issued in the form of "compliance advice letters" - public on Friday.ComCom wrote in a media release that the current fee levels of around NZ$20 to NZ$25 "were generally generating profit in addition to recovering the actual costs of late payment by card holders."The release went on to state that "in the Commission's view this practice does not comply with the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act."The commission said that costs that appear to have been included in the fee are in the Commission's opinion "too far removed from the act of late payment to be properly recoverable in this way."There is some price pressure to lower penalty fees in New Zealand, and doing so is partly a function of the ComCom investigation that commenced last year. One angle relevant to the much heralded (but yet to be filed) class action against banks in Australia over penalty fees is that fees in the order of $15 (NZ or Australian, it doesn't really matter) can be justified.As for the class action, enthusiastic spruiking continued in metropolitan newspapers over the weekend.IMF (Australia), through its subsidiary Financial Redress, reached the required 100,000 minimum registrations for the planned case at some stage during last week, and only one week after lighting up the public relations for this scheme.