North America · Canada

Interac: Canada's domestic card scheme

Interac is a domestic card scheme used in Canada. Canada's domestic debit and e-Transfer network. Available to consumers in Canada. This page covers how the flow works, where consumers use it, and which merchants should accept it.

Updated July 31, 2026Domestic card schemeBy Ale Aznar
Country
Canada
Region
North America
Type
Domestic card scheme
This is a stub profile — a fuller Interac write-up is on the roadmap. In the meantime the operational detail below is available to founding partners.

How the Interac flow works

Interac is a domestic card scheme available in Canada. Full public profile pending — contact us to prioritise this method.

Typical use cases

  • Merchants selling to consumers in Canada.

Consumer reach

Available to consumers in Canada.

Who should accept Interac

  • Merchants targeting the Canada market.

Operational detail

The operational half of every method profile — settlement, refunds, disputes, PSP coverage and licensing — is reserved for Payment Methods List founding partners. It's the part vendor sites won't publish and the part that actually decides whether Interac works for your stack.

Founding partner access

Settlement time

How fast Interac funds land after the payer confirms, behaviour outside scheme hours, whether the rail settles gross or net, and the realistic T+n to sweep to USD/EUR — plus the PSPs where the advertised timeline actually holds in Canada.

Book a founding-partner call →
Founding partner access

Refund mechanics

How Interac refunds are executed end-to-end when the rail has no scheme-level reversal — payer-initiated pulls, credit transfers, or PSP-fronted refunds — plus partial-refund support, time limits, and the API surface each PSP exposes.

Book a founding-partner call →
Founding partner access

Chargeback exposure

Whether Interac has any dispute construct at all, which recall/return/indemnity vectors actually exist on the rail, how consumer-protection rules in Canada route claims back to merchants, and observed loss rates versus cards.

Book a founding-partner call →
Founding partner access

PSP coverage matrix

Which acquirers and aggregators run direct rail connections to Interac vs. reselling a partner, coverage depth and reliability, effective pricing bands, and who to pick when Canada volume is your primary use case.

Book a founding-partner call →
Founding partner access

KYC & licensing notes

Requirements to accept Interac — local entity vs. cross-border MoR, licensing regime governing the rail in Canada, KYC obligations at onboarding and per-transaction, and FX/reporting rules for foreign merchants.

Book a founding-partner call →

Frequently asked questions about Interac

What is Interac?

Interac is a domestic card scheme used in Canada, in the North America region. Canada's domestic debit and e-Transfer network. The profile on this page documents the checkout flow step by step, the use cases it fits, the consumer base that can pay with it, and the merchant types that should carry it. Last reviewed July 31, 2026 by Ale Aznar.

Which countries does Interac cover?

Interac is recorded against Canada in the North America region, which is the market where its consumer reach is meaningful for merchants. Cross-border acceptance depends on the acquirer or merchant-of-record you use rather than on the rail itself. The Canada country hub lists every other alternative and local method tracked for that market alongside Interac.

What does Interac cost a merchant?

Pricing for Interac is not a single published number: it moves with monthly volume, vertical, entity type and whether you connect through a direct acquirer or an aggregator. Effective pricing bands per provider, plus the fixed-fee and FX components that sit alongside the headline rate, are part of the founding-partner dataset rather than this public Canada profile.

Which PSPs and aggregators give access to Interac?

Access to Interac runs either through an acquirer with a direct rail connection or through an aggregator reselling a partner's connection, and the two differ in reliability and reporting. The list of providers processing Interac in Canada today, whether each is direct or resold, and where onboarding is currently restricted sits in the founding-partner PSP coverage matrix.

Is Interac available for Merchants selling to consumers in Canada?

Yes. That is one of the documented use cases for Interac in Canada: Merchants selling to consumers in Canada. Vertical eligibility is ultimately set by the provider you onboard with, not by the rail, so regulated categories such as gambling, crypto and adult content are commonly excluded even where the domestic card scheme itself supports the flow. Confirm the restriction list with your acquirer.

What are the settlement time and currency for Interac?

Interac is a domestic card scheme, so the payer-side confirmation and the merchant-side payout are separate events with different timing. Settlement windows, cut-off behaviour outside scheme hours, the payout currency, and the realistic timeline to sweep funds out of Canada are documented in the operational section of this profile, available to Payment Methods List founding partners.