Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly • Hacker News Board

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#501

Post by runeks » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 4:54 PM UTC

mrweasel wrote: post #394

tappio wrote: post #311

This is a very us centric view. Most of the europe is so much ahead of US in payments that it is funny. There are dozens of alternative payment methods in the Europe. Especially in the Nordics card payments are on a big decline. There are basically two "tracks" to move money - card networks and bank to bank. Most new payment methods use bank transfer as the method of moving money. In the Nordics, every country has a…

Just to clarify, the Danish mobile payment system (cleverly named: MobilePay) is based on debit cards, not bank to bank transfer. The system that was designed to do bank to bank, without the card systems being involved failed horribly. It was late to market and the launch has horrible mismanaged and covered in unnecessary secrecy. MobilePay had already launched and crabbed a large share of the market, the secrecy was…

> Just to clarify, the Danish mobile payment system (cleverly named: MobilePay) is based on debit cards, not bank to bank transfer.

This is incorrect. MobilePay started out as a layer on top of Dankort (Danish debit card), but after gaining sufficient volume they made a deal with all Danish banks to enable direct bank-to-bank transfers (without using the Dankort infrastructure).

The only difference between Swipp and MobilePay is that Swipp started out only supporting bank-to-bank transfers (thus only supporting a few banks) while MobilePay started out using Dankort (thus supporting all banks). And, as soon as MobilePay had sufficient volume, all banks were interested in circumventing the Dankort network.

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#502

Post by wolf550e » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 4:58 PM UTC

matthewdgreen wrote: post #483

briandear wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So get a rewards card. Some percentage of the sales taxes go to support programs I don’t agree with or use. And I can’t escape that. However, one could start a cash-only store if one wanted. You are also ignoring the cost of cash. Theft and cash handling isn’t a zero cost. Why should I, as a credit card user, be forced to subsidize losses due to cash handling? We could also talk shoplifting as well; policies that don…

You shouldn't be forced to subsidize anything. That's the whole point. At a minimum: the government should recognize the market power imbalance between card processors and small businesses, and ensure that the stores can set their own prices appropriately. If cash or debit is genuinely more expensive, let stores reflect that fact in their prices offered to consumers -- rather than prohibiting it via a contract they c…

The government can make a law that says credit card merchant agreements cannot prevent a shop from making cash prices lower than credit card prices.

Then shops will have two prices cash price and credit card price. Then people will use cash more, and the government will lose some of the information they get from reading everyone's credit card transactions.

Do you think this affects the government's decision? Or are politicians simply bribed by visa/mastercard?

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#503

Post by ferzul » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 4:59 PM UTC

vinniejames wrote: post #473

cactus2093 wrote: post #471

You can’t talk about credit cards in isolation without considering the rest of the consumer finance sector in the US. A big part of the reasons credit cards rose to such prominence is that the banking and payment rails are so incredibly stupidly designed. The check system and ACH which is the highest volume way that money is sent between people with different banks requires you to give out the secret key every time y…

"not liable for paying it," but you're still paying it at the end of the day via fees and increased merchant prices

if the merchant doesn't charge a creditcard surcharge, and using a credit card is worth 1€ to me, and costs 1.01€/transaction to the merchant. but only 90% of transactions are by credit card. well, then i am better off paying by credit card, since 10% of transactions are subsidising my 1€.

(strangely, in australia, card surcharges became normalised just before cash payments fell off a cliff. credit card transactions have also declined; it's visa/mc debit that have skyrocketed.)

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#504

Post by sukilot » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 5:34 PM UTC

ferzul wrote: post #503

vinniejames wrote: post #473

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"not liable for paying it," but you're still paying it at the end of the day via fees and increased merchant prices

if the merchant doesn't charge a creditcard surcharge, and using a credit card is worth 1€ to me, and costs 1.01€/transaction to the merchant. but only 90% of transactions are by credit card. well, then i am better off paying by credit card, since 10% of transactions are subsidising my 1€. (strangely, in australia, card surcharges became normalised just before cash payments fell off a cliff. credit card transactions…

A credit card costs about 3% not 1%. A credit card is a prisoner's dilemma problem where once anyone uses it, the others are pressured to use it also to cut their losses.

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#505

Post by sukilot » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 5:40 PM UTC

FeepingCreature wrote: post #424

SenoraRaton wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. Those were the kind of boot…

Note: this is a market inefficiency. In an efficient well-operating system, if you can afford ten dollars a year for cheap boots, you should be able to get some agreement with your employee or a local bank to get a loan for $50 boots plus some interest that's still gonna be less than the cumulative $10 you pay for fresh boots every year. If you will reliably have the money for $10 boots and can prove/provide evidence…

Also there is a huge risk that the $50 boots aren't actually any better.

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#506

Post by jobigoud » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 6:03 PM UTC

namdnay wrote: post #387

jobigoud wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know anyone personally that owns a "credit" card. Virtually nobody uses them here in France and I think in the rest of Europe, it's always debit card. Never had an issue with renting cars.

It is a common issue for French people renting cars outside of France - search on Google, there are hundreds of angry people who ended up with no car because agencies in other countries refuse debit cards (debit immediat)

I should have been more specific, In the past few years I have rented cars in Europe, in the US, in South Africa and in Australia. Never had an issue. I generally use Avis or Budget, sometimes a local company.

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#507

Post by _8j50 » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 6:51 PM UTC

bluesign wrote: post #378

_8j50 wrote: post #21

Would be happy to buy a usable cryptocoin card. I was thinking about interest-free crypto-loans where the debtor would speculate on the value of the currency at the time it will paid off (like options trading). If you loan 100btc you would loan with the speculation that for example it would be 10% more valuable in a year. If in a year your speculation is correct, you break even, if the price is 10% lower, the debtee…

You have 1 btc lets say 10k usd. So in one year i have to pay you 11k. It is basically 10% interest.

Intetest accumulates, if it takes you 2 years to pay, you owe 12k normally. Regardless of how long your payment plan is, how much you owe depends on the speculation date (the sooner it is, the more predictable and less risky). Bigger loans would be issued for less trustworthy customers if the speculation/first payment date is very soon. But let's say the first payment is a year away and the debtor speculates too high of an increase in currency value,then they would come off as bad debtors no one wants a loan from. But the more conservative their speculation on long term currency value, the more reasonable and appealing of a debtor they appear to be. So if you will start paying me back a year from now,I might speculate a 2% increase in value but if you will pay back in a few weeks I can more accurately predict and say a 5-10% increase. Since the worst outcome for the debtor if payment is made is "my cash is insured against loss" they have the incentive to make conservative speculations that lure debtees. If a well known and reputed person uses their valuable site/business for a $1M loan that will be paid in 5 years and you loan them with a 3% increase speculation you will get 30k for the risk you took on and guarantee that not only will you not lose money but will gain at least 3%,regardless of economic crashes or market volatility.

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#508

Post by omosubi » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 6:55 PM UTC

komali2 wrote: post #497

alt_f4 wrote: post #449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For fuck's sake, do some basic research. Literally at the top of the wikipedia article: > Visa does not issue cards, extend credit or set rates and fees for consumers; rather, Visa provides financial institutions with Visa-branded payment products that they then use to offer credit, debit, prepaid and cash-access programs to their customers.

I get the impression you don't think much of me. That's ok, but why did you feel the need to tell me?

alt_f4 is a troll. I don't think they understand what we're arguing about lol

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#509

Post by blacklion » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 7:04 PM UTC

lotsofpulp wrote: post #477

blacklion wrote: post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How could I know are my card credit or debit from system's point of view? I have two cards in my bank, both are exactly same MC cards, embossed, and all (not some Maestro variation). One card is linked with my current account — I have real money at this account, my employer pays my salary by transfer to this account and such. I can not pay if thus account is depleted. Second card is linked with credit account, where…

Based on your description, you have one debit card and one credit card. If it says debit on the front of the card, it is debit. I’ve never seen this work in person, but some people claim their debit card worked as a credit card and whatnot. Even if that is true, all merchant systems I’ve worked with allow the merchant/cardholder to select debit or restrict transactions to only debit.

Both cards don't have words "debit" neither "credit" on them. I need to be really careful to use right one, as they are virtually indistinguishable. Yes, from my point if view one is debit and one is credit, but I wonder is it possible to know what does payment system think about them? I dream about bank for geeks, where all technical information about each transaction could be seen in web interface :-)

Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly

#510

Post by kazinator » Tue, Jun 30, 2020, 7:09 PM UTC

systemvoltage wrote: post #209

komali2 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every debit card I've had has still involved a credit card company in some way - they've all had the visa logo on them.

That's true, I am not too familiar with the finance system, how come a debit card needs a middle man such as VISA? They help with the transaction between two banks?

The situation is that there is a network called Visa Debit that some banks use for their network for debit transactions. It may seem new, but it evidently dates back as far as 1982.

I'm in Canada. With one exception, no bank client card I have had (which were all usable for debit) had any Visa logo on it. That includes current ones.

The exception is one TD client card.

The situation is explained here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_Debit#Canada

TD is one of the banks that offer Visa Debit. This TD client card is also Interac-branded, so I'm guessing that the card will use the Interac network for domestic transactions, and in that case its Visa Debit personality does not come into play.

Those are not the only two networks for debit/ATM in Canada. There is also "The Exchange":

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Accel_(interbank_network)#The_...

(used by a lot of smaller banks and credit unions).

The Canadian Credit Union Association also runs an ATM network called AccuLink.

It's important to know which network your card uses if you want "ding free" transactions. E.g a "The Exchange" card can be used at an "Interac" ATM, but there will be a fee.