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To be more specific, this is a US credit card topic. Debit card fees are capped in the US, yet I’ve never received a discount from a merchant for paying with d
by tiffanyh 1mo ago
To be more specific, this is a US credit card topic.
Debit card fees are capped in the US, yet I’ve never received a discount from a merchant for paying with debit instead of credit.
As such, I just pay with credit and have never understood this argument.
- post-it 1mo agoThat's what makes it a wealth transfer, from debit card users to you.
- iso1631 1mo agoIn my country card fees are less than cash fees, so I guess that's a wealth transfer from card payers to cash payers?
- tiffanyh 1mo agoThat’s a great point. Managing cash for a merchant also brings real costs as well. You have to take it to the bank or pay a service to pick up cash. You’re way more likely to have “leakage” when any cashier can pocket cash. Etc
- deleted 1mo ago[deleted]
- SkiFire13 1mo agoThe costs of credit cards are higher in part because of the reward programs for using such cards. That's where the wealth transfer happens, and there's nothing like this for cash.
- kevin_thibedeau 1mo agoI stuck to a debit card for decades but got tired of the discrimination after it was rejected by the IRS as validation for COVID stimulus. Gas stations could be problematic. Canada could be problematic. Everything works with a credit card. If you are a responsible spender you may as well reap the benefit of the wealth transfer.
- KolmogorovComp 1mo ago> As such, I just pay with credit and have never understood this argument. Because the merchant pass the higher processing cost to all customers.
- rcxdude 1mo agoAnd often the credit card companies try to enforce this by writing wording into their contracts that try to stop merchants offering different prices for different payment methods.
- hunter-gatherer 1mo agoThis is true. In fact, if you come across a merchant that accepts credit with a minimum purchase amount or tacks an extra fee, you can take the receipt and call the terminal owner (visa/MasterCard) and report it. The receipt has a terminal ID, and it turns out the likes of Visa get really pissed if merchants do that. I know this because I used to work on a US military base. There was a sole merchant on a particular installation that was doing this, but it was extreme. They'd force you to buy over 10 USD if you wanted to use a card, and it was the only place to grab a snack. One day there terminal was shut down, and for a period they only went to cash payments. Once they took credit again they removed the minimum purchase. Turns out somebody got pissed, and reported them. Regarding the article, the ~390 USR sounds about right to me. I only use a credit card, pay it completely off at the end of the month. I've never once paid interest since in the 8 years I have used this card. Every few years I buy a plan ticket with the rewards.
- gcr 1mo agoIn NYC, most independent shops give a debit card discount / credit card surcharge.
- rowls66 1mo agoCard network rules in the US prohibit merchants from adding a surcharge for payment with a debit card. Most merchants are either unaware, or prefer not to care. If you are using a debit card at a business that assesses a card surcharge, point out that your card is a debit card when paying and refuse to pay the surcharge. If that does not help, there are online forms available from both Mastercard and Visa where you can submit a merchant complaint.
- StrauXX 1mo agoThe card processors policies are anti-competetive (albeit legal) abuses of their oligopoly. Reporting small vendors to them does not seem right to me.
- borski 1mo agoThat is not true: https://www.lawpay.com/about/blog/credit-card-surcharge-rules/ https://www.lawpay.com/about/blog/credit-card-surcharge-rule... It used to be true, but this changed many years ago.
- greenavocado 1mo agoOnce ever I was requested to either pay cash or via debit in a cafe in Montreal
- fHr 1mo agoGood for you as you're smart but less smart people don't do this and then get scammed legally.
- ipython 1mo agoUntil 2013, visa and Mastercard forbade merchants from charging more for credit card payments if they accept their credit cards.
- lazide 1mo agoAnd it wasn’t out of the goodness of their hearts that they changed - they finally lost enough big court cases over it, it was to avoid heavy handed legislation.
- cpburns2009 1mo agoPlaces around me have been starting to itemize the credit card fee. Only car dealerships so far have waived the fee for debit over credit in my experience.
- ghaff 1mo agoIt's not unheard of. Gas sometimes. My car dealer for one. (Whether it's a credit surcharge or a debit discount is semantics.) Though with the cashback on my usual credit card I use for domestic credit card purchases, the difference is pretty much not worth worrying about.
- sandmn 1mo agoI think it's true for most businesses with single transaction being big enough - car dealerships, child care, rent. On the other hand many of them are not happy with cash either because processing cash also incur fees that are not nesessarily less than credit card fees. Most businesses that prefer to take cash are smaller ones because most likely they won't report it.