4 ms·

Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. The country I live in, Switzerland, has a very widely accepted QR-based payment system...

Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. The country I live in, Switzerland, has a very widely accepted QR-based payment system... but credit cards (in mobile wallets) are more convenient, safer, faster. The only time I use the QR codes is when a merchant doesn't have a card terminal.

closewith 1y ago
> Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. That's because you (and everyone else in Switzerland, even those paying cash) is eating a 2-3% merchant fee markup. In the civilised world like the EU, where credit card interchange fees are capped of 0.3%, those cashback benefits (which is, again, your money you've just paid) don't exist. > worldwide acceptance For now, at a huge economy-wide cost. That skimmed 2-3% is what Trump is trying to protect. > peace of mind That's also country-dependent. In many countries, credit card transactions have no additional protections and chargebacks aren't the magic bullet they are in some. > more convenient, safer, faster. Pix is more convenient, safer (much, much safer and lower risk of fraud), and faster than credit cards. Cheaper too.
- brainwad 1y ago
  Switzerland has interchange fees of 0.4% for consumer credit cards (by contactless, only slightly higher by chip+pin): https://www.visaeurope.ch/content/dam/VCOM/regional/ve/unitedkingdom/PDF/fees-and-interchange/july-2023/switzerland-interchange-fees-jul-23.pdf https://www.visaeurope.ch/content/dam/VCOM/regional/ve/unite..., https://www.mastercard.com/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/eu/europe-lfi/europeaninterchange/pdfs/48switzerland.pdf https://www.mastercard.com/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/.... And yet banks offer 0.33% cashback cards: https://certo-card.ch/one https://certo-card.ch/one. And let's not forget that cash acceptance costs an order of magnitude more than this anyway; if anything businesses should charge surcharges for accepting cash, not the other way around, and given the social constraint of no surcharges, cashback is a fair mechanism to reward efficient payment methods.
  - closewith 1y ago
    > Switzerland has interchange fees of 0.4% for consumer credit cards Only since Wednesday of this week due to COMCO action, so no-one knows if cashback will persist, but it will be a lot less than .33%. > And let's not forget that cash acceptance costs an order of magnitude more than this anyway; In the EU, it's .5% for cash vs .3% for cards, but the situation falls back into favour for cash once fraud is accounted for.
    - brainwad 1y ago
      > Only since Wednesday of this week due to COMCO action That Visa fee table is dated July 2023?
      - closewith 1y ago
        Right, but prior to this week, the merchant account providers just raised scheme fees to compensate.
henry700 1y ago
The cashback you are given back is taken from a fraction of the fee levied on merchants by the Payment Processing company they use. The only thing holding this system together is the lobby (also funded by a part of the aforementioned fee on merchants) by the Payment Processing industry to uphold laws that prohibit more expensive payments for more expensive payment methods, and also the extensive marketing (funded by guess what). It's an extremely simple yet ingrained system, and the only way to topple it and stop paying hidden costs thinking you're getting an extremely good deal on cashback, is to peel back the curtains and realize it, and make most of the politically-active part of the country's population to do so too.
- ivape 1y ago
  But, who do you get to call in a world like that? I think the West really likes customer service and security.
  - henry700 1y ago
    Suspicious transactions are a legitimate use-case for payment processing. If you don't fully trust who you're buying from, the scam preventions, chargebacks, refunds etc. work fine. But buying lunch or small chocolates, cigarretes etc with credit cards is INSANE.
  - miltava 1y ago
    Why do you think PIX doesn’t have customer service or security? It’s regulated by the central bank but operated by private companies.
- brainwad 1y ago
  Credit card isn't more expensive than its main competitor, cash, though. It's just the costs of credit card acceptance are transparently added to each transaction, while the costs of cash are distributed over the whole day's cash transactions and so more opaque. Merchants have a psychological (and in some countries, legal) barrier to charging more for cash than other payment methods, even though it's the least efficient. Given this, cash-back is the best way to share the efficiency gains with the end user. Maybe if Pix or Twint or debit cards or what-have-you are so efficient, they should also give consumers cashback.
azlev 1y ago
Bear in mind that Brazil is a poor country. Cashback and worldwide acceptance is not what 90% brasillians need. You are right about convenience, but here, 1% fee makes a huge difference to make both ends meet. You can give alms with pix, to show how widespread pix is.
- miltava 1y ago
  It’s more like 3% if you receive the money after 30 data and 10% if you get it in the best day.
- vouaobrasil 1y ago
  Brazil is actually a pretty rich country. It's just that the wealth is exceptionally highly concentrated at the top. Brazil has enormous resources and potential, but all that potential gets sucked up by the big boys in their club. Although I know what you mean, it's important to distinguish Brazil from a genuinely poor-all-over country where there is not much wealth anywhere. Even in poor or average neighbourhoods in the big cities, you can see a person with nothing and then another person drive by in a BMW.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
miltava 1y ago
Yes. But credit cards have high costs for the merchant. Thats why they get to give us cashback. It depends on the country, but the cut rate goes from 1% (in europe) to 3% in Brazil. And the merchant gets the money after a long time. It is possible to advance the payment but the rates are much higher (10%+). So, i dont think we can even think of credit cards as instant payment. And it has mich higher costs that, in the end, go back to the consumers.
somedude895 1y ago
Yeah but Twint is a piece of crap. Maybe Pix or Alipay are faster to use. But I agree, Apple Pay is pretty much perfect in terms of UX for in-store and especially for online payments.

closewith 1y ago

> Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. That's because you (and everyone else in Switzerland, even those paying cash) is eating a 2-3% merchant fee markup. In the civilised world like the EU, where credit card interchange fees are capped of 0.3%, those cashback benefits (which is, again, your money you've just paid) don't exist. > worldwide acceptance For now, at a huge economy-wide cost. That skimmed 2-3% is what Trump is trying to protect. > peace of mind That's also country-dependent. In many countries, credit card transactions have no additional protections and chargebacks aren't the magic bullet they are in some. > more convenient, safer, faster. Pix is more convenient, safer (much, much safer and lower risk of fraud), and faster than credit cards. Cheaper too.

brainwad 1y ago
Switzerland has interchange fees of 0.4% for consumer credit cards (by contactless, only slightly higher by chip+pin): https://www.visaeurope.ch/content/dam/VCOM/regional/ve/unitedkingdom/PDF/fees-and-interchange/july-2023/switzerland-interchange-fees-jul-23.pdf https://www.visaeurope.ch/content/dam/VCOM/regional/ve/unite..., https://www.mastercard.com/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/eu/europe-lfi/europeaninterchange/pdfs/48switzerland.pdf https://www.mastercard.com/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/.... And yet banks offer 0.33% cashback cards: https://certo-card.ch/one https://certo-card.ch/one. And let's not forget that cash acceptance costs an order of magnitude more than this anyway; if anything businesses should charge surcharges for accepting cash, not the other way around, and given the social constraint of no surcharges, cashback is a fair mechanism to reward efficient payment methods.
- closewith 1y ago
  > Switzerland has interchange fees of 0.4% for consumer credit cards Only since Wednesday of this week due to COMCO action, so no-one knows if cashback will persist, but it will be a lot less than .33%. > And let's not forget that cash acceptance costs an order of magnitude more than this anyway; In the EU, it's .5% for cash vs .3% for cards, but the situation falls back into favour for cash once fraud is accounted for.
  - brainwad 1y ago
    > Only since Wednesday of this week due to COMCO action That Visa fee table is dated July 2023?
    - closewith 1y ago
      Right, but prior to this week, the merchant account providers just raised scheme fees to compensate.

henry700 1y ago

The cashback you are given back is taken from a fraction of the fee levied on merchants by the Payment Processing company they use. The only thing holding this system together is the lobby (also funded by a part of the aforementioned fee on merchants) by the Payment Processing industry to uphold laws that prohibit more expensive payments for more expensive payment methods, and also the extensive marketing (funded by guess what). It's an extremely simple yet ingrained system, and the only way to topple it and stop paying hidden costs thinking you're getting an extremely good deal on cashback, is to peel back the curtains and realize it, and make most of the politically-active part of the country's population to do so too.

ivape 1y ago
But, who do you get to call in a world like that? I think the West really likes customer service and security.
- henry700 1y ago
  Suspicious transactions are a legitimate use-case for payment processing. If you don't fully trust who you're buying from, the scam preventions, chargebacks, refunds etc. work fine. But buying lunch or small chocolates, cigarretes etc with credit cards is INSANE.
- miltava 1y ago
  Why do you think PIX doesn’t have customer service or security? It’s regulated by the central bank but operated by private companies.
brainwad 1y ago
Credit card isn't more expensive than its main competitor, cash, though. It's just the costs of credit card acceptance are transparently added to each transaction, while the costs of cash are distributed over the whole day's cash transactions and so more opaque. Merchants have a psychological (and in some countries, legal) barrier to charging more for cash than other payment methods, even though it's the least efficient. Given this, cash-back is the best way to share the efficiency gains with the end user. Maybe if Pix or Twint or debit cards or what-have-you are so efficient, they should also give consumers cashback.

azlev 1y ago

Bear in mind that Brazil is a poor country. Cashback and worldwide acceptance is not what 90% brasillians need. You are right about convenience, but here, 1% fee makes a huge difference to make both ends meet. You can give alms with pix, to show how widespread pix is.

miltava 1y ago
It’s more like 3% if you receive the money after 30 data and 10% if you get it in the best day.
vouaobrasil 1y ago
Brazil is actually a pretty rich country. It's just that the wealth is exceptionally highly concentrated at the top. Brazil has enormous resources and potential, but all that potential gets sucked up by the big boys in their club. Although I know what you mean, it's important to distinguish Brazil from a genuinely poor-all-over country where there is not much wealth anywhere. Even in poor or average neighbourhoods in the big cities, you can see a person with nothing and then another person drive by in a BMW.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]

miltava 1y ago

Yes. But credit cards have high costs for the merchant. Thats why they get to give us cashback. It depends on the country, but the cut rate goes from 1% (in europe) to 3% in Brazil. And the merchant gets the money after a long time. It is possible to advance the payment but the rates are much higher (10%+). So, i dont think we can even think of credit cards as instant payment. And it has mich higher costs that, in the end, go back to the consumers.

somedude895 1y ago

Yeah but Twint is a piece of crap. Maybe Pix or Alipay are faster to use. But I agree, Apple Pay is pretty much perfect in terms of UX for in-store and especially for online payments.