Consumer Confidential: Debit-card cap, higher air fares, free treats at Starbucks

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Here’s your you-better-think Thursday roundup of consumer news from around the Web:

--A $50 spending cap for debit cards? JPMorgan Chase is reportedly considering just such a move, capping debit card transactions at either $50 or $100 because of new limits on what banks can charge merchants to process transactions. Every time you swipe your debit card, your bank charges the retailer an average fee of 44 cents. Those so-called interchange fees add up to about $16 billion per year, according to the Federal Reserve. But as part of financial-reform legislation passed last year, these fees will be capped at 12 cents. As such, banks say they won’t be fairly compensated for their time and effort (even though we’re talking about an entirely automated process), and thus they’re looking at new restrictions on debit cards. Can you say ‘sour grapes’?

--Here we go again. American Airlines is raising its base fares by $10 per round trip. If the increase sticks, it will be the seventh broad price hike so far this year by U.S. airlines, which say they need more cash to cover rising fuel prices. Other major carriers say they’re studying American’s move but haven’t yet decided whether to play along. Airlines are also boosting fees. In the last two weeks, JetBlue raised the charge for checking a second bag to $35 from $30, and American boosted the cost of making a flight reservation by phone to $25 from $20. The Consumer Travel Alliance says passengers paid U.S. airlines more than $9.2 billion in fees last year, and many of the charges weren’t disclosed to passengers when they bought their tickets. Nice.

--In the mood for a free treat? Our friends at Starbucks are giving away a free ‘petite’ pastry Thursday through Saturday from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. to celebrate the chain’s 40th anniversary. Starbucks is also unveiling other goodies for the big occasion, including a new line of small-sized sweets and a ‘tribute blend’ coffee consisting of beans from Sumatra, Ethiopia, Papua New Guinea and Colombia. What’s the catch for those free yummies? You have to buy a drink to go along with the carbs and calories, and the treats are available, as they say, only while supplies last.

-- David Lazarus