Who wins and who loses with the new food stamp rules?

The MP (Provisional Measure) that changes important points related to food and meal vouchers, approved earlier this month by Congress, displeased part of the worker benefit company market, which moves about R$ 90 billion per year.

While the project awaits presidential sanction, with the deadline this Friday (2), companies responsible for operating the service and restaurants are pressuring the government to veto some points of the text.

The two rules that have generated the most divergence are the possibility for the worker to withdraw in cash the balance that he has not used after 60 days and to be able to change, free of charge, the company that operates the payment of the aid, choosing which food stamp or meal he wants. use, the so-called portability.

cash withdrawal

The request to veto the section that allows the withdrawal of the cash benefit after two months is a consensus among the companies, as they claim that, in this case, the worker could use the resource to buy anything and not just food, distorting the purpose of the PAT (Worker’s Food Program).

The change goes against one of the MP’s own points, which requires that the benefits must be used only to pay for meals in restaurants and cafeterias or for the purchase of food, in addition to being considered a “disguised salary”.

Companies in the sector warn that the benefit could lead to the practice of “lending money”, with the sale of vouchers in exchange for loans, and stimulate an illegal market.

“We believe that the president will veto this provision. It is unanimous in the sector”, says Jéssica Srour, executive director of ABBT (Brazilian Association of Workers’ Benefits Companies).

portability

The possibility of free portability, however, already generates divergence between traditional companies (which dominate about 90% of the market), restaurants, and new companies that want to expand in the segment.

According to ABBT, the action, which at first may seem simple, creates difficulties and may make it impossible for employers to grant the benefit, who will have to internally manage dozens of different operators to pay the benefit.

“Let’s say that the worker makes a portability to a new company and that company goes bankrupt, who would be responsible for this credit? Would the employer have to pay again? The portability, without regulation, offers many legal risks”, says Srour, executive director of the entity that has 17 members, including Sodexo, Alelo and Ticket.

Abrasel (Brazilian Association of Bars and Restaurants) is also opposed to portability and claims that it encourages the “cashback” market (cash reward) to attract customers and, with that, would transfer costs to establishments.

iFood, which entered the food and meal voucher market two years ago with iFood Benefits, believes that portability is essential and will put decision-making power in the hands of the worker.

“He who will decide where he wants to receive the voucher. Forcing services to improve and leading to the expansion of the accredited network”, says Lucas Pittioni, legal director of iFood. Pittioni defends, however, that there is a regulation before the rule, scheduled for May 2023, goes into effect.

In the view of fintech Caju, at first glance, portability may seem favorable to competition, but, as predicted, without regulation, there are great chances of being harmful to the market.

“The vague wording about the device makes room for companies to offer aggressive cashbacks for employees to migrate from benefit provider”, says Karen Fletcher, Head of Legal at Caju.

In practice, according to her, it is as if the rebate (a discount widely used by the companies that provided the vouchers), which was prohibited for contracting companies, was now offered directly to employees.

Establishments will have to accept all flags

The text also provides for the so-called interoperability between flags. Which means that the worker will be able to use the card in restaurants that are not accredited by his brand – it is enough for the establishment to accept payment in meal vouchers for him to be able to use his credits.

Traditional operators, gathered in ABBT, are against it, stating that it will not be possible to guarantee the quality of the restaurant chain.

The newer companies on the market are in favor and claim that these mechanisms will bring more competition and facilitate the use of the benefit by the user.

“You have a credit and debit card market that charges fees that vary from 1.5% to 3% and a second PAT market that varies from 6% to 8%. What explains this difference? With more competition, these rates will fall, as happened with the market for credit card machines. Which will be positive for the consumer”, says Pittioni, legal director of iFood.

According to a survey carried out by LCA Consultores, at the request of iFood, 1 in 3 restaurants transfers the value of the food stamp fee to consumers. The vast majority of establishments (91%) consider the rates of traditional benefit companies to be very high.

The delay in transferring the amounts is another reason that makes some establishments decline to use food stamps. Also according to the survey, if the fees for RVs and VAs went to levels similar to credit card fees (from 7% to around 2%), a reduction of up to 2.6% in the price of food for the worker.