3 ms·
I once had a conversation with a merchant about not taking AmEx. He told me they could take it, their machine and merchant accounts were all set up, but instead
by rjmunro 2y ago
I once had a conversation with a merchant about not taking AmEx. He told me they could take it, their machine and merchant accounts were all set up, but instead of getting paid [whatever they charged] - [small percentage merchant fee] relatively quickly, they were sent a bill for AmEx fees that was almost impossible to correlate with sales. AmEx only paid them for the sales later.
AmEx are 'better' for customers because they screw the merchants over.
- AdamN 2y agoThese days most merchants are large or small and just use Square or some POS where they don't even know what's happening so not sure this is really an issue anymore.
- hnbad 2y agoI've had cashiers in Germany balk at my debit card because it says "Visa" on it and tell me "we only take EC" or sometimes even "we only take EC or Maestro". The joke is of course that EC hasn't existed since 2007 (when it was renamed to "girocard") and Maestro was discontinued by MasterCard, which is why many German banks replaced Maestro debit cards with Visa debit cards. I wouldn't rely on cashiers to know more than just whether they take debit or credit.
- AdamN 2y agoThe EC/girocard thing is real though - those POS devices usually don't work with my American Visa - just my Deutsche Bank "EC" karte.
- psunavy03 2y agoThis has generally always been true for credit cards; it's also the genesis of the "we don't take Discover" joke above. Better for consumers == merchants have more hassles.