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It's interesting that operating a massive financial network and charging a 3% fee is too much, but app marketplaces with much less cap ex charge a 30% fee and t

It's interesting that operating a massive financial network and charging a 3% fee is too much, but app marketplaces with much less cap ex charge a 30% fee and they're just now being challenged. App market places where you have no option but to use, when you can always pay cash in person.

marssaxman 3y ago
> when you can always pay cash in person One might wish that were true, but I am seeing a disturbing proliferation of "no cash accepted" signs here in Seattle.
- naasking 3y ago
  > I am seeing a disturbing proliferation of "no cash accepted" signs here in Seattle. Is that even legal? I thought retailers must accept all legal forms of tender.
  - devilbunny 3y ago
    They cannot refuse cash for a debt that is owed, but they can refuse to conduct a transaction with it beforehand.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - naasking 3y ago
      What qualifies as a debt? If I walk into a cashless convenience store and eat a chocolate bar before paying, can I force them to accept cash?
      - tredre3 3y ago
        In your scenario you're not accruing a legitimate debt, you stole something (admittedly with the intention of paying for it later).
        naasking 3y ago
        My question is, what formally distinguishes "outstanding payment" from "legitimate debt"?
        devilbunny 3y ago
        The judge. Can you leave the item behind? Were the terms explicitly stated?
  - astura 3y ago
    Of course it's legal. Its also common (try paying for anything on an airplane in cash, for one example). This is such a misconception that the federal reserve has a page on it. https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm >There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.
    - ipqk 3y ago
      What do you mean "of course". It's not legal in unincorporated Kings County outside Seattle. It's also not legal in NYC. I wouldn't be surprised in Seattle bans card-only retail in the near future.
      - astura 3y ago
        I said "of course" because it's very common for businesses to not accept cash when it's inconvenient to. Airplanes are just one example I gave. The federal reserve addresses state/local laws: >Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise. These laws are new and only exist in a few locales.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
        marssaxman 3y ago
        I can't agree that the exotic case of wanting to buy something while flying on an airplane counts as "very common"! The laws are new because the practice they react against is, generally speaking, a recent problem.
  - lapetitejort 3y ago
    Not in New York: https://www.cashmatters.org/blog/why-new-york-is-defending-cash https://www.cashmatters.org/blog/why-new-york-is-defending-c... I'm seeing more cashless stores in my area and it disturbs me. Hopefully my state can adopt a similar law. I am also increasingly seeing cash prices versus card prices. I'm more inclined to pay cash for smaller shops where 3% matters to their bottom line. Plus it's always good to have a dollar on hand for buskers.
  - vel0city 3y ago
    I've even seen more and more vending machines that are cash-free, only credit card transactions.
    - sofixa 3y ago
      This is a no brainer. Who the hell carries around coins and bills in small denominations for vending machines that will refuse bills that are too wrinkled or might be falling apart? A simple tap is so much more practical. Not to mention the reduced risk of miscounting/counterfeit currency, or robbery.
- aurareturn 3y ago
  Likely due to crimes against businesses that hold cash at the retail location? And that if you pay cash, it’s harder to ask for tips. Plus, cash is just slower to transact and you have to spend resources to count and manage. The only advantage is if you want to scam the irs.
mschuster91 3y ago
> App market places where you have no option but to use, when you can always pay cash in person. Try renting a car or hotel without a credit card.
- _aavaa_ 3y ago
  debit card?
  - nkozyra 3y ago
    A lot of car rental companies still don't accept debit cards or if they do they make the process more difficult and/or expensive.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - iamjake648 3y ago
    Countless times I've been at the Airport and overhear people complaining about not being able to use their Debit Card with a rental car, or that they don't have enough money in their account to cover would just be a pre-authorization on a credit card.
  - deathanatos 3y ago
    Rental car companies loathe debit cards, for reasons so sane person can fathom. Last time we rented, they (Hertz, as it was) outright refused our debit card.
    - avalys 3y ago
      They don’t like renting to people with bad credit.
      - deathanatos 3y ago
        … you don't need to care about credit if you accept cold, hard cash. (Even still, I don't think "has credit card" is a good proxy for credit worthiness.)
spencerflem 3y ago
I agree 100%, but to be fair I buy at most $10/year in Android apps, and almost every single thing bought online & usually in person too, goes through a credit card.
mperham 3y ago
> when you can always pay cash in person. Legally no one has to accept cash except for "debts, public and private". If a business is selling you something, they can stipulate any form of payment since it isn't a "debt".
- no_wizard 3y ago
  >debts, public and private And yet, I can't pay my mortgage off with a briefcase of cash. I think this has a lot of caveats too. Not least of which hide behind "KYC" and anti money laundering laws
  - Dylan16807 3y ago
    > And yet, I can't pay my mortgage off with a briefcase of cash. I won't worry too much about the word "off" since paying early is a fussy contract thing. Otherwise, have you tried? I'm pretty doubtful they can refuse.
  - brewdad 3y ago
    I'm sure you could but it would involve setting up an in-person appointment at a specific location of their choosing. Also, expect to fill out a bunch of extra paperwork to show where the cash came from.
- ipqk 3y ago
  Many city/counties ban cashless retail.
- _v7gu 3y ago
  What is a sales contract but the admittance of debts on both sides? The seller owes the buyer the good, and the buyer owes the seller the money. Everything is debt in contracts-land and it is quite fascinating. If you'd like, I can stipulate on how "no cash accepted" signs work even though you can force people to accept cash to settle debts.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
KennyBlanken 3y ago
It's not remotely comparable. App stores provide, among other things, the CDN for app downloads and updates. I don't know about you, but damn near every app on my phone is getting updates multiple times a week. That bandwidth, and the architecture to provide it at scale up to "hundreds of millions of devices", is not free. Google, for example, provides a massive toolkit of functions and services as part of the Play Store that's not built-in to Android itself. Both companies provide an entire development environment for free. Etc. Also not free is the infrastructure to run the stores, nor provide security and quality review services. Apple does a lot of automated and human inspection of apps, and while it's not perfect in many ways (and perfect is an impossible standard anyway) it's still an important, valuable service that costs a fuckton of money to run. Credit card networks mostly just pass transactions around, with some fraud stuff. Almost everything is handled by the processors and banks. Really, the problem here is that credit cards don't have competition from wire transfer services that are common in the EU, for example. For decades it's been possible to instantly pay another person or a merchant for a product or service and them to see the transfer happened. Zelle is the only thing that comes close in the US, and it was started by a couple of large banks who were fed up with the lack of modernization of the US wire transfer system. We're the laughing stock of the world, taking days for a wire transfer to go through...
- alemanek 3y ago
  In the U.S. credit cards would still be superior to direct transfer services like they have in Europe. If someone gets my Card and Pin I don’t get back that money; at least not easily. But if someone steals my credit card I get that money back immediately. I travel quite a bit so I am aware that credit cards don’t work like that everywhere. But, for US issued credit cards the fraud protection alone make them hard to beat. Not great for the merchant though.
- mixmastamyk 3y ago
  > Google, for example, provides a massive toolkit of functions and services They already did, as well as the expertise, so the extra expense is not large in relation.
MatthiasPortzel 3y ago
Just want to mention, these fees are ~3% plus some fixed cost between 5 and 30 cents. This does push the effective percentage up when looking at small transactions like those commonly made in an app store. Stripe is the highest I’ve seen with a 30 cents fixed charge, but this means for a $5 purchase, they’re effectively charging 8.9%.
- nabakin 3y ago
  I mean you can say the inverse about merchant fees and large purchases. I think Stripe's way of doing things is better because it's inline with the actual expenses they incurr. To their servers, there's no difference between a $1000 purchase and a $1 purchase. The cost to them remains the same so the transaction fee should account for that cost. Let the customer figure out how to eliminate that cost without hiding it from them. Scaling by purchase amount subsidizes smaller purchases, but it allows merchants to take way more money than needed to process the transaction from larger transactions and most people don't even know that it's there and that they are paying significantly more money for an item than they need to. All these card rewards just waste people's time and in the end, the house always wins. This whole reward game is a direct result of this percentage merchant system and I'd rather not have it.
whimsicalism 3y ago
i mean the cap ex is that you have to build a phone.

marssaxman 3y ago

> when you can always pay cash in person One might wish that were true, but I am seeing a disturbing proliferation of "no cash accepted" signs here in Seattle.

naasking 3y ago
> I am seeing a disturbing proliferation of "no cash accepted" signs here in Seattle. Is that even legal? I thought retailers must accept all legal forms of tender.
- devilbunny 3y ago
  They cannot refuse cash for a debt that is owed, but they can refuse to conduct a transaction with it beforehand.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - naasking 3y ago
    What qualifies as a debt? If I walk into a cashless convenience store and eat a chocolate bar before paying, can I force them to accept cash?
    - tredre3 3y ago
      In your scenario you're not accruing a legitimate debt, you stole something (admittedly with the intention of paying for it later).
      - naasking 3y ago
        My question is, what formally distinguishes "outstanding payment" from "legitimate debt"?
        devilbunny 3y ago
        The judge. Can you leave the item behind? Were the terms explicitly stated?
- astura 3y ago
  Of course it's legal. Its also common (try paying for anything on an airplane in cash, for one example). This is such a misconception that the federal reserve has a page on it. https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm >There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.
  - ipqk 3y ago
    What do you mean "of course". It's not legal in unincorporated Kings County outside Seattle. It's also not legal in NYC. I wouldn't be surprised in Seattle bans card-only retail in the near future.
    - astura 3y ago
      I said "of course" because it's very common for businesses to not accept cash when it's inconvenient to. Airplanes are just one example I gave. The federal reserve addresses state/local laws: >Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise. These laws are new and only exist in a few locales.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - marssaxman 3y ago
        I can't agree that the exotic case of wanting to buy something while flying on an airplane counts as "very common"! The laws are new because the practice they react against is, generally speaking, a recent problem.
- lapetitejort 3y ago
  Not in New York: https://www.cashmatters.org/blog/why-new-york-is-defending-cash https://www.cashmatters.org/blog/why-new-york-is-defending-c... I'm seeing more cashless stores in my area and it disturbs me. Hopefully my state can adopt a similar law. I am also increasingly seeing cash prices versus card prices. I'm more inclined to pay cash for smaller shops where 3% matters to their bottom line. Plus it's always good to have a dollar on hand for buskers.
- vel0city 3y ago
  I've even seen more and more vending machines that are cash-free, only credit card transactions.
  - sofixa 3y ago
    This is a no brainer. Who the hell carries around coins and bills in small denominations for vending machines that will refuse bills that are too wrinkled or might be falling apart? A simple tap is so much more practical. Not to mention the reduced risk of miscounting/counterfeit currency, or robbery.
aurareturn 3y ago
Likely due to crimes against businesses that hold cash at the retail location? And that if you pay cash, it’s harder to ask for tips. Plus, cash is just slower to transact and you have to spend resources to count and manage. The only advantage is if you want to scam the irs.

mschuster91 3y ago

> App market places where you have no option but to use, when you can always pay cash in person. Try renting a car or hotel without a credit card.

_aavaa_ 3y ago
debit card?
- nkozyra 3y ago
  A lot of car rental companies still don't accept debit cards or if they do they make the process more difficult and/or expensive.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- iamjake648 3y ago
  Countless times I've been at the Airport and overhear people complaining about not being able to use their Debit Card with a rental car, or that they don't have enough money in their account to cover would just be a pre-authorization on a credit card.
- deathanatos 3y ago
  Rental car companies loathe debit cards, for reasons so sane person can fathom. Last time we rented, they (Hertz, as it was) outright refused our debit card.
  - avalys 3y ago
    They don’t like renting to people with bad credit.
    - deathanatos 3y ago
      … you don't need to care about credit if you accept cold, hard cash. (Even still, I don't think "has credit card" is a good proxy for credit worthiness.)

spencerflem 3y ago

I agree 100%, but to be fair I buy at most $10/year in Android apps, and almost every single thing bought online & usually in person too, goes through a credit card.

mperham 3y ago

> when you can always pay cash in person. Legally no one has to accept cash except for "debts, public and private". If a business is selling you something, they can stipulate any form of payment since it isn't a "debt".

no_wizard 3y ago
>debts, public and private And yet, I can't pay my mortgage off with a briefcase of cash. I think this has a lot of caveats too. Not least of which hide behind "KYC" and anti money laundering laws
- Dylan16807 3y ago
  > And yet, I can't pay my mortgage off with a briefcase of cash. I won't worry too much about the word "off" since paying early is a fussy contract thing. Otherwise, have you tried? I'm pretty doubtful they can refuse.
- brewdad 3y ago
  I'm sure you could but it would involve setting up an in-person appointment at a specific location of their choosing. Also, expect to fill out a bunch of extra paperwork to show where the cash came from.
ipqk 3y ago
Many city/counties ban cashless retail.
_v7gu 3y ago
What is a sales contract but the admittance of debts on both sides? The seller owes the buyer the good, and the buyer owes the seller the money. Everything is debt in contracts-land and it is quite fascinating. If you'd like, I can stipulate on how "no cash accepted" signs work even though you can force people to accept cash to settle debts.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

KennyBlanken 3y ago

It's not remotely comparable. App stores provide, among other things, the CDN for app downloads and updates. I don't know about you, but damn near every app on my phone is getting updates multiple times a week. That bandwidth, and the architecture to provide it at scale up to "hundreds of millions of devices", is not free. Google, for example, provides a massive toolkit of functions and services as part of the Play Store that's not built-in to Android itself. Both companies provide an entire development environment for free. Etc. Also not free is the infrastructure to run the stores, nor provide security and quality review services. Apple does a lot of automated and human inspection of apps, and while it's not perfect in many ways (and perfect is an impossible standard anyway) it's still an important, valuable service that costs a fuckton of money to run. Credit card networks mostly just pass transactions around, with some fraud stuff. Almost everything is handled by the processors and banks. Really, the problem here is that credit cards don't have competition from wire transfer services that are common in the EU, for example. For decades it's been possible to instantly pay another person or a merchant for a product or service and them to see the transfer happened. Zelle is the only thing that comes close in the US, and it was started by a couple of large banks who were fed up with the lack of modernization of the US wire transfer system. We're the laughing stock of the world, taking days for a wire transfer to go through...

alemanek 3y ago
In the U.S. credit cards would still be superior to direct transfer services like they have in Europe. If someone gets my Card and Pin I don’t get back that money; at least not easily. But if someone steals my credit card I get that money back immediately. I travel quite a bit so I am aware that credit cards don’t work like that everywhere. But, for US issued credit cards the fraud protection alone make them hard to beat. Not great for the merchant though.
mixmastamyk 3y ago
> Google, for example, provides a massive toolkit of functions and services They already did, as well as the expertise, so the extra expense is not large in relation.

MatthiasPortzel 3y ago

Just want to mention, these fees are ~3% plus some fixed cost between 5 and 30 cents. This does push the effective percentage up when looking at small transactions like those commonly made in an app store. Stripe is the highest I’ve seen with a 30 cents fixed charge, but this means for a $5 purchase, they’re effectively charging 8.9%.

nabakin 3y ago
I mean you can say the inverse about merchant fees and large purchases. I think Stripe's way of doing things is better because it's inline with the actual expenses they incurr. To their servers, there's no difference between a $1000 purchase and a $1 purchase. The cost to them remains the same so the transaction fee should account for that cost. Let the customer figure out how to eliminate that cost without hiding it from them. Scaling by purchase amount subsidizes smaller purchases, but it allows merchants to take way more money than needed to process the transaction from larger transactions and most people don't even know that it's there and that they are paying significantly more money for an item than they need to. All these card rewards just waste people's time and in the end, the house always wins. This whole reward game is a direct result of this percentage merchant system and I'd rather not have it.

whimsicalism 3y ago

i mean the cap ex is that you have to build a phone.