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TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

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Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#441

Post by duskwuff »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #434
duskwuff wrote: post #427

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you get a merchant account, part of the application process is describing what your business is, what it sells, and what your expected sales volume is. These metrics are used for fraud detection and risk management. Using a merchant account for a purpose which you haven't disclosed to the processor -- like a cell phone store selling a truck -- is a violation of the merchant agreement, and is often grounds for ac…

I know that. You avoided addressing either of my points though. 1. Is selling trucks against the terms in general? 2. This is a cell phone store selling a cell phone store truck. It's part of the business, not something unrelated. If they had thought of it, they probably would have made trucks or no trucks a part of the processing agreement up front. They thought it was a reasonable use, and it might have even been a…

> 1. Is selling trucks against the terms in general?

Probably not, but I can't rule it out. It's certainly an unusual thing to accept a credit card payment for, and the fact that vehicles are titled property may complicate matters.

> 2. This is a cell phone store selling a cell phone store truck. It's part of the business, not something unrelated.

No, it isn't. The business of a cell phone store is, generally speaking, going to be selling cell phones and cell phone accessories, and its merchant account will have been obtained with the understanding that it would only be used for charges related to those products. It isn't in the business of selling cash registers or furniture or trucks, even if it may happen to possess those things as a business; if it wants to sell those things, it needs to accept payment through some other means.

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#442

Post by Aeolun »

a2tech wrote: post #70
Aeolun wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My only consolation is that every other provider is just as terrible. My experience with Authorize.net support was really good. Their tech stack/api was absolutely archaic, but you could talk to real humans.

And the thing about their tech stack is its old..but absolutely workable. They have examples in pretty much every language, decent documentation, and support. And they are very slow to sunset things because their customers are slow moving traditional businesses. So code you write for a customer may work without tweaking for 4, 5, or even 10 years.

At the time I championed switching to Stripe. If I’d known then what I know now I’d have never done so.

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#444

Post by Dylan16807 »

duskwuff wrote: post #441
Dylan16807 wrote: post #434

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that. You avoided addressing either of my points though. 1. Is selling trucks against the terms in general? 2. This is a cell phone store selling a cell phone store truck. It's part of the business, not something unrelated. If they had thought of it, they probably would have made trucks or no trucks a part of the processing agreement up front. They thought it was a reasonable use, and it might have even been a…

> 1. Is selling trucks against the terms in general? Probably not, but I can't rule it out. It's certainly an unusual thing to accept a credit card payment for, and the fact that vehicles are titled property may complicate matters. > 2. This is a cell phone store selling a cell phone store truck. It's part of the business, not something unrelated. No, it isn't. The business of a cell phone store is, generally speakin…

> generally speaking

> its merchant account will have been obtained with the understanding

> if it wants to sell those things, it needs to accept payment through some other means

So it's not part of the general business, but it is the business doing the sale, and such a thing was not part of the merchant account negotiation.

...I don't see a single thing you actually disagree with me over?

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#445

Post by xyzzy_plugh »

toss1 wrote: post #440
xyzzy_plugh wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is one thing when they happen by accident, but when it is the result of capricious and hostile decisions by a vendor, it is an outrage. I couldn't agree more. Which of these is happening with respect to the OP? It's entirely not clear.

It doesn't matter — even if it started entirely as an accident— the vendor's failure to promptly address it, and the fact that that failure is a systematic property of their operation, puts them into the outrageous category. It's like when you're on hold for 20minutes hearing recordings about long wait timed due to "high call volume". No, it is not high call volume, it is the damn company systematically understaffing…

I agree it's ridiculous that the vendor has gone radio silent -- in any other industry this would be deadly behavior.

But I've been in weird, regulatory spots before where communication is forbidden pending investigation or an audit. If you get flagged for money laundering, they're not allowed to say "hey we flagged you for money laundering", and possibly not even allowed to say "we're looking into it".

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#447

Post by Schroedingersat »

whatisweb3 wrote: post #192
Schroedingersat wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe one day non-custodial and permissionless payment rails will prevent this situation, for those services that choose to use it. Shame that HN is so polarized about blockchain that they refuse to entertain the idea. It's a shame that we've only figured out "pay $200 to the guy using a derelict coal plant to run the world's fanciest space heater" and "pay $200 to the guy who hoards the most of your 'currency'" th…

Lol this comment reveals a lot of ignorance. My last transaction fee on Eth was in the range of $1, most of that value is burned and not sent to a miner, and anyone who wants to participate in protocol rewards can do so through delegation. PoS is not perfect but far better than current norm of “pay a billion dollar corporation a fixed fee and also give them total control of the world’s payment rails.”

Burning is identical to regressive redistribution. It takes value from those who transact and assigns it directly to those who hoard through deflation. If you have a money velocity of 5 and an average transaction of $100 and burn 1% every transaction, it is equivalent to a ~5% pa tax directly into the pockets of currency hoarders. No different to paying visa 1% or $1 per transaction.

It's not an improvement. Just a changing of the guard with less oversight.

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#448

Post by whatisweb3 »

Schroedingersat wrote: post #447
whatisweb3 wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol this comment reveals a lot of ignorance. My last transaction fee on Eth was in the range of $1, most of that value is burned and not sent to a miner, and anyone who wants to participate in protocol rewards can do so through delegation. PoS is not perfect but far better than current norm of “pay a billion dollar corporation a fixed fee and also give them total control of the world’s payment rails.”

Burning is identical to regressive redistribution. It takes value from those who transact and assigns it directly to those who hoard through deflation. If you have a money velocity of 5 and an average transaction of $100 and burn 1% every transaction, it is equivalent to a ~5% pa tax directly into the pockets of currency hoarders. No different to paying visa 1% or $1 per transaction. It's not an improvement. Just a c…

"Pay $1 to a single private company" is not the same as "pay $1 toward every circulating token in the network." If you consider this a tax, it is a tax distributed to all current and future holders of the currency, including the user doing the transaction.

If "changing of the guard" means replacing VISA with thousands of VISAs in a decentralized network, where any non-VISA can become yet another VISA through permissionless software, that is far better in my opinion.

If you have another economic model than EIP 1559 that you feel is superior, you have the power to propose that as an EIP and start to develop consensus around it. EIP 1559 was first proposed in 2019 and it took some years for consensus to build around it.

Re: TIFU by using Stripe as a payment processor for my small business

#449

Post by Schroedingersat »

whatisweb3 wrote: post #448
Schroedingersat wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Burning is identical to regressive redistribution. It takes value from those who transact and assigns it directly to those who hoard through deflation. If you have a money velocity of 5 and an average transaction of $100 and burn 1% every transaction, it is equivalent to a ~5% pa tax directly into the pockets of currency hoarders. No different to paying visa 1% or $1 per transaction. It's not an improvement. Just a c…

"Pay $1 to a single private company" is not the same as "pay $1 toward every circulating token in the network." If you consider this a tax, it is a tax distributed to all current and future holders of the currency, including the user doing the transaction. If "changing of the guard" means replacing VISA with thousands of VISAs in a decentralized network, where any non-VISA can become yet another VISA through permissi…

> If you consider this a tax, it is a tax distributed to all current and future holders of the currency, including the user doing the transaction.

Yes. A tax on every transaction apportioned by wealth to current holders (not to future holders because they will receive fewer tokens from constant input). A regressive tax.

> If "changing of the guard" means replacing VISA with thousands of VISAs in a decentralized network, where any non-VISA can become yet another VISA through permissionless software, that is far better in my opinion.

It's not 'thousands of visas' though. It's "a big faceless entity taking a fee on every transaction with the rules being set and the takings being apportioned by wealth" being replaced by "a big faceless entity taking a fee on every transaction with the rules being set and the takings being apportioned by wealth" the ability to volunteer to provide infrastructure doesn't change that.

> If you have another economic model than EIP 1559 that you feel is superior, you have the power to propose that as an EIP and start to develop consensus around it. EIP 1559 was first proposed in 2019 and it took some years for consensus to build around it.

The entire 'a deflationary token on one global trustless network, buy now or miss out' model has fundamental unsolved and potentially unsolvable flaws. It is capitalism distilled and on fast forward without the grifters even having to make the pretense of being involved in real productive activity.

We don't need 'currency but on the internet' to solve 'how do we distribute stuff'. We needto think about the problem from scratch. Blockchains may even be a part of it, but so long as d(wealth)/dt ~ wealth, it's just another method of making the same people rich.

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