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Me too. Here in Europe credit cards are a lot less popular for daily use. Most people I know have debit cards for in person shopping. Prepaid debit for Internet

Me too. Here in Europe credit cards are a lot less popular for daily use. Most people I know have debit cards for in person shopping. Prepaid debit for Internet shopping or they use alternative payment methods (blik, fast transfers etc). That's why I found it so annoying certain "global" companies like Google insist people pay for some of their services with a credit card or an account linked debit card(no prepaid cards). I don't see what benefit they get from forcing people to open a separate account. If there is no money in that account they will not be able to take a payment. It's exactly like a prepaid card(assuming you disable overdraft). So why don't they accept prepaid? To piss people off I guess.

helf 3y ago
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WirelessGigabit 3y ago
When I pay with a credit card I get a couple of things: 1) Item not delivered / broken / service not what I ordered => dispute. 2) Shop hacked and 2 months later charges my credit card $20,000? The charge hits and I dispute it, but the money is not gone out of my account. Can you imagine them hitting my debit account?
- jtbayly 3y ago
  I can. I’ve had it happen. That’s why I don’t use debit cards anymore. The fees “I” racked up were terrible because of bounced checks missed CC payments and so forth.
- hakfoo 3y ago
  I wonder if to an extent, the US tendency to use credit card "protections" is an outsourcing of consumer-protection law. Some countries, I gather that the consumer-protection authorities have a lot of teeth, and they're a viable way to escalate on a lot of bad behaviour (denying return of defective goods, or refusing to honour warranty). In the US, I don't think this is as common-- you might be able to raise an issue with your state Attorney General, and in 2029 he'll get to it-- so the magic word is "chargeback" to get a response.
cagey 3y ago
I'm not familiar with European prepaid debit cards, but they sound similar to what in the USA we call "gift cards": the latter are "preloaded" with a certain dollar amount which the holder of the card can spend in transactions using the gift card, and they are practically never "refilled". If the above describes the prepaid debit card you are referring to, putting myself in eg Google's shoes re your (heavily paraphrased) question: > why don't certain "global" companies like Google not accept payment for some of their services via prepaid debit? I'm in business providing a long-term open ended service (cell, ISP, household utility). I want to ensure ongoing receipt of monthly payments for the service I am delivering with minimum hassle to myself and my customer. If I accepted autopay from a prepaid debit card (as I define it above), the card is certain to "run dry" at some point, guaranteeing a need for future intervention in the payment setup, and (unless the consumer is closely monitoring the prepaid card's balance as the months pass, which is unlikely) likely an interruption in the stream of monthly payments, with an associated likelihood of me interrupting service to the customer due to lack of payment (all costing me administrative overhead), resulting in me possibly losing the customer's business for good. With autopay tied to a bank account, the primary payment risk is insufficient account balance; with autopay tied to a credit card, the risk of insufficient balance is nearly nonexistent; in general, the risk of interruption of payments from these two payment sources is low (vs nearly certain with a prepaid debit card).
yomlica8 3y ago
You said it yourself. If there is no money in your account, google can't take payment. That isn't true of credit cards. And they're closely linked to a person's identity which is pretty useful to a company that makes hay with ads and user tracking.

helf 3y ago

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WirelessGigabit 3y ago

When I pay with a credit card I get a couple of things: 1) Item not delivered / broken / service not what I ordered => dispute. 2) Shop hacked and 2 months later charges my credit card $20,000? The charge hits and I dispute it, but the money is not gone out of my account. Can you imagine them hitting my debit account?

jtbayly 3y ago
I can. I’ve had it happen. That’s why I don’t use debit cards anymore. The fees “I” racked up were terrible because of bounced checks missed CC payments and so forth.
hakfoo 3y ago
I wonder if to an extent, the US tendency to use credit card "protections" is an outsourcing of consumer-protection law. Some countries, I gather that the consumer-protection authorities have a lot of teeth, and they're a viable way to escalate on a lot of bad behaviour (denying return of defective goods, or refusing to honour warranty). In the US, I don't think this is as common-- you might be able to raise an issue with your state Attorney General, and in 2029 he'll get to it-- so the magic word is "chargeback" to get a response.

cagey 3y ago

I'm not familiar with European prepaid debit cards, but they sound similar to what in the USA we call "gift cards": the latter are "preloaded" with a certain dollar amount which the holder of the card can spend in transactions using the gift card, and they are practically never "refilled". If the above describes the prepaid debit card you are referring to, putting myself in eg Google's shoes re your (heavily paraphrased) question: > why don't certain "global" companies like Google not accept payment for some of their services via prepaid debit? I'm in business providing a long-term open ended service (cell, ISP, household utility). I want to ensure ongoing receipt of monthly payments for the service I am delivering with minimum hassle to myself and my customer. If I accepted autopay from a prepaid debit card (as I define it above), the card is certain to "run dry" at some point, guaranteeing a need for future intervention in the payment setup, and (unless the consumer is closely monitoring the prepaid card's balance as the months pass, which is unlikely) likely an interruption in the stream of monthly payments, with an associated likelihood of me interrupting service to the customer due to lack of payment (all costing me administrative overhead), resulting in me possibly losing the customer's business for good. With autopay tied to a bank account, the primary payment risk is insufficient account balance; with autopay tied to a credit card, the risk of insufficient balance is nearly nonexistent; in general, the risk of interruption of payments from these two payment sources is low (vs nearly certain with a prepaid debit card).

yomlica8 3y ago

You said it yourself. If there is no money in your account, google can't take payment. That isn't true of credit cards. And they're closely linked to a person's identity which is pretty useful to a company that makes hay with ads and user tracking.