4 ms·

I've noticed recently indie (non-franchise) merchants being much more brazen about charging extra fees for accepting a credit card payment. This includes counte

I've noticed recently indie (non-franchise) merchants being much more brazen about charging extra fees for accepting a credit card payment. This includes counters at my local farmer's market, two local cafes and a sushi restaurant, and my city's public electrical utility. All of them are happy to receive cash or interac (Canadian debit infrastructure) or even e-transfers in some cases (Canadian venmo). But they'll say an extra $1-2 charge if you want to pay by credit card. Maybe I'm just remembering badly, but I don't remember encountering this twenty years ago; back then the rules were clear that you either didn't accept credit payments, or you did and it was the same price as cash.

bigthymer 8mo ago
> Maybe I'm just remembering badly, but I don't remember encountering this twenty years ago; back then the rules were clear that you either didn't accept credit payments, or you did and it was the same price as cash My memory is in accordance with yours
- MoonWalk 8mo ago
  But before that it was commonplace to see discounts for cash, especially at gas stations. Then credit-card issuers started prohibiting it in service agreements, but that was outlawed during the Obama administration.
mixmastamyk 8mo ago
Because credit card companies mandated that you couldn't raise prices to pay their fees. Believe this was later outlawed in the US and perhaps elsewhere.
- stevehawk 8mo ago
  in the US it was a class action lawsuit + Supreme Court decision
- MoonWalk 8mo ago
  It was part of the Obama administration's banking reforms, if I remember correctly. It outlawed credit-card issuers' prohibition on giving cash discounts. It also included a number of other valuable consumer protections, such as forcing card issuers to provide clear advance notice of interest-rate increases. The financial-system reforms were some of the Obama administration's most valuable.
  - SR2Z 8mo ago
    Imagine having a president who cares about unsexy policy wonk issues that make a huge difference to everyone. Feels like a distant memory these days.
    - MoonWalk 8mo ago
      And a last gasp for the USA's dignity.
carlosjobim 8mo ago
Small business owners ("indies") are notorious for getting hung up on fees and costs which do not matter, while ignoring important savings and revenue sources. That's why they haven't grown to be bigger. A sensible business owner increases the base price a little to offset card fees instead of bothering customers with these details and losing sales.
- MoonWalk 8mo ago
  You obviously don't know any small-business owners and didn't read the article. Credit-card issuers in the USA are a textbook example of a consumer- and retailer-harming monopoly.
  - OptionOfT 8mo ago
    I think credit card fees are often positioned against what businesses believe is the cost of cash, i.e. zero. However, with cash one needs to have / has / has to pay for: * a more complex register * a person who takes more time to do the transaction * someone who counts the register at the end of the day to ensure it matches * someone who drives to the bank to deposit the money (at random times) * additional insurance * a bank account which probably charges for these cash services If you don't count time, then cash is better. And also, in Europe, if you as a business prefer cash, we all know it means that you make X, but you only report X/2.
    - thayne 8mo ago
      But unless you don't accept cash at all, you have to do that anyway.
      - mikepurvis 8mo ago
        I've been to several cashless cafes that just had a Square tap thingy. That said, I expect the cost of taking cash does scale to some degree with how much of it you take. Obviously you still need a cash register, but if only 10-20% of your business is cash, maybe it only needs to be reconciled and emptied out every second or third day? And it's a faster and lower stakes process if there's less in it? Insurance is cheaper as well if the total loss is 1/10 what it would be if every dime was passing through there.
Marsymars 8mo ago
> Maybe I'm just remembering badly, but I don't remember encountering this twenty years ago Merchant agreements didn't allow surcharges until 2022: https://www.cbc.ca/news/credit-card-surcharge-faq-1.6610356 https://www.cbc.ca/news/credit-card-surcharge-faq-1.6610356
joshstrange 8mo ago
What are people’s general thoughts on Interac? As someone who just implemented support for it in a POS application I don’t have a high opinion of it. You must be online [0] to process the transaction and you can’t refund/void unless the card is present. Which means if you call in later with an issue, we can’t refund you remotely, you have to come back into the store to do a refund. [0] I know this may seem strange to some of you, but restaurants don’t always have stable internet. Most do, but there a long tail of locations with flakey or slow internet. And business owners are not always willing to pay for 5G backup.
- mikepurvis 8mo ago
  I like it just on principle for being something the Canadian banks collaborate on without involving Visa or Mastercard, unlike in the US where debit also goes through their networks. From the consumer side, I don't use it all that often for purchases just because I'm aware of the interchange fee tax on cash purchases so I try to maximize the value of my credit cards: 3x Avion points for grocery spend on RBC ION+, 2 Aeroplan pts/$ for dining on Amex. As far as a requirement to be online, given the nature of debit that doesn't surprise me; the whole point relative to credit is that no one has to trust you to pay a bill later. If offline transactions were possible then it would just be a credit card by another name. The refund thing surprises me, but I expect that has to do with preventing some fraud scenario, maybe like an inside job where an employee issues remote refunds to a confederate? Overall it seems like the design of the system is fairly conservative and that's reflected in the much lower fees; the whole point is to not have to have whole armies of people answering the phones to help grandma get back $50.
  - joshstrange 8mo ago
    Yeah, I can understand needing to be online and I can 100% get on board with not using Visa/Mastercard. It's the in-person refunds that are annoying, just sucks for customer support "You have to come back in".

bigthymer 8mo ago

> Maybe I'm just remembering badly, but I don't remember encountering this twenty years ago; back then the rules were clear that you either didn't accept credit payments, or you did and it was the same price as cash My memory is in accordance with yours

MoonWalk 8mo ago
But before that it was commonplace to see discounts for cash, especially at gas stations. Then credit-card issuers started prohibiting it in service agreements, but that was outlawed during the Obama administration.

mixmastamyk 8mo ago

Because credit card companies mandated that you couldn't raise prices to pay their fees. Believe this was later outlawed in the US and perhaps elsewhere.

stevehawk 8mo ago
in the US it was a class action lawsuit + Supreme Court decision
MoonWalk 8mo ago
It was part of the Obama administration's banking reforms, if I remember correctly. It outlawed credit-card issuers' prohibition on giving cash discounts. It also included a number of other valuable consumer protections, such as forcing card issuers to provide clear advance notice of interest-rate increases. The financial-system reforms were some of the Obama administration's most valuable.
- SR2Z 8mo ago
  Imagine having a president who cares about unsexy policy wonk issues that make a huge difference to everyone. Feels like a distant memory these days.
  - MoonWalk 8mo ago
    And a last gasp for the USA's dignity.

carlosjobim 8mo ago

Small business owners ("indies") are notorious for getting hung up on fees and costs which do not matter, while ignoring important savings and revenue sources. That's why they haven't grown to be bigger. A sensible business owner increases the base price a little to offset card fees instead of bothering customers with these details and losing sales.

MoonWalk 8mo ago
You obviously don't know any small-business owners and didn't read the article. Credit-card issuers in the USA are a textbook example of a consumer- and retailer-harming monopoly.
- OptionOfT 8mo ago
  I think credit card fees are often positioned against what businesses believe is the cost of cash, i.e. zero. However, with cash one needs to have / has / has to pay for: * a more complex register * a person who takes more time to do the transaction * someone who counts the register at the end of the day to ensure it matches * someone who drives to the bank to deposit the money (at random times) * additional insurance * a bank account which probably charges for these cash services If you don't count time, then cash is better. And also, in Europe, if you as a business prefer cash, we all know it means that you make X, but you only report X/2.
  - thayne 8mo ago
    But unless you don't accept cash at all, you have to do that anyway.
    - mikepurvis 8mo ago
      I've been to several cashless cafes that just had a Square tap thingy. That said, I expect the cost of taking cash does scale to some degree with how much of it you take. Obviously you still need a cash register, but if only 10-20% of your business is cash, maybe it only needs to be reconciled and emptied out every second or third day? And it's a faster and lower stakes process if there's less in it? Insurance is cheaper as well if the total loss is 1/10 what it would be if every dime was passing through there.

Marsymars 8mo ago

> Maybe I'm just remembering badly, but I don't remember encountering this twenty years ago Merchant agreements didn't allow surcharges until 2022: https://www.cbc.ca/news/credit-card-surcharge-faq-1.6610356 https://www.cbc.ca/news/credit-card-surcharge-faq-1.6610356

joshstrange 8mo ago

What are people’s general thoughts on Interac? As someone who just implemented support for it in a POS application I don’t have a high opinion of it. You must be online [0] to process the transaction and you can’t refund/void unless the card is present. Which means if you call in later with an issue, we can’t refund you remotely, you have to come back into the store to do a refund. [0] I know this may seem strange to some of you, but restaurants don’t always have stable internet. Most do, but there a long tail of locations with flakey or slow internet. And business owners are not always willing to pay for 5G backup.

mikepurvis 8mo ago
I like it just on principle for being something the Canadian banks collaborate on without involving Visa or Mastercard, unlike in the US where debit also goes through their networks. From the consumer side, I don't use it all that often for purchases just because I'm aware of the interchange fee tax on cash purchases so I try to maximize the value of my credit cards: 3x Avion points for grocery spend on RBC ION+, 2 Aeroplan pts/$ for dining on Amex. As far as a requirement to be online, given the nature of debit that doesn't surprise me; the whole point relative to credit is that no one has to trust you to pay a bill later. If offline transactions were possible then it would just be a credit card by another name. The refund thing surprises me, but I expect that has to do with preventing some fraud scenario, maybe like an inside job where an employee issues remote refunds to a confederate? Overall it seems like the design of the system is fairly conservative and that's reflected in the much lower fees; the whole point is to not have to have whole armies of people answering the phones to help grandma get back $50.
- joshstrange 8mo ago
  Yeah, I can understand needing to be online and I can 100% get on board with not using Visa/Mastercard. It's the in-person refunds that are annoying, just sucks for customer support "You have to come back in".