With the Reserve Bank due to outline its revised standard on merchant surcharging on card payments this week, a coalition of merchants, business groups and consumer advocates has launched a campaign to promote the benefits of not surcharging.Surcharge Free describes itself as a "national movement urging businesses across the country to end the payment surcharge once and for all." Its plan is to raise awareness of the positive impact for business of not surcharging.The National Retail Association, furniture retailer Coco Republic, online fashion retailer The Iconic, Hair and Beauty Australia and Platinum Restaurant Group are among those that have signed on to the campaign, which is backed by American Express.The campaign is drawing on research that shows the vast majority of people dislike being surcharged and that a significant proportion of people would think twice about giving repeat business to a merchant that surcharged them.There were about 5000 submissions to the Financial System Inquiry calling for surcharging to be banned or excessive surcharging to be policed more effectively. The FSI said surcharging could improve the efficiency of the payments system by providing accurate price signals to customers on the cost of using different payment methods. It supported the principle that merchants can surcharge to reflect their relative costs of accepting different payment methods.However, it acknowledged the high level of consumer dissatisfaction with excessive surcharging and recommended that appropriate levels of surcharging could be achieved by providing merchants with clearer surcharging limits.In his response to the FSI last October, Treasurer Scott Morrison said the Government would legislate to ban merchants from imposing unfair card surcharges that are greater than the cost to them of accepting payment by card.The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission was given the job of enforcing new surcharging regulations and the Reserve Bank was given the job of writing the regulations.Surcharge Free spokesman Christopher Zinn said the group did not want to revisit the policy process. Instead it is hoping to encourage merchants to see the value of responding to consumer dislike of surcharging."We are not asking the Government to ban surcharging. We have been through a lot of consultation. Our interest is in giving out information, empowering consumers and getting business to look at the issue," Zinn saidSurcharge Free has a logo (which can be viewed at the website: www.surchargefree.com.au) which merchants will be encouraged to display."What we are going to do is give merchants that have chosen not to surcharge a chance to tell their stories and connect with consumers. We want others to join and we will highlight them in our campaign," Zinn said.