The code, intended to promote fair business practices and ensure merchants and consumers clearly understand the costs and benefits of credit and debit cards, won't be finalized before early next year.

It aims to provide merchants with more pricing flexibility so consumers can choose the best payment option, Flaherty said, and it would allow merchants to choose which payment options they accept.

Flaherty is putting the draft proposal out for input from stakeholders over the next two months and he said he expects the code will be made final early in the New Year.

Among other elements of the code:

-It would require credit- and debit-card companies to give merchants at least 90-days' notice of changes to transaction fees.

And

-It would allow merchants to cancel contracts with card issuers without penalty after notification of fee changes.

He said the government will make final revisions and additions to the code based on the feedback it receives, “then quickly move to bring the code into force as soon as possible early in the new year.''

Recently released regulations also protect credit-card users by making clearer and more transparent information available to them.