U.S. retailers, especially discount warehouses, love the Discover Card for its lower merchant fees. However, starting April 1st, Discover Card merchants will have to shell out an extra eight cents for every credit card transaction. This is the first time in six years Discover is raising merchant fees. The basic discount rates will remain at the same level but Discover is adding a per transaction fee for all merchants. The new 8 cent per transaction fee represents about 10 basis points (0.10%) for the average Discover Card transaction. Discover also announced it is launching a new version of Tran$action Tracker later this year which will enable merchants to have free Internet access to transaction reporting, including access to ticket retrieval, and chargeback information. Discover offers the lowest merchants fees of all the major U.S. brands with transaction fees averaging below 2.0% of each sale, versus 2.0% for VISA/MasterCard, and 2.69% for American Express. Discover logged more than $90 billion in transaction volume for 2000, according to CardData. For more information on Discover visit www.discovercard.com.