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Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

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Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#621

Post by Premiuum »

drexlspivey wrote: post #48
sudden_dystopia wrote: post #3

This is the best, and in my opinion, only use case for Ethereum

Micropayments will be the killer app for crypto imo, once the $0.30 minimum transaction fee by the gatekeepers goes away a whole new universe of business models and revenue streams opens up. You can literally stream money if you want to. Lightning Network is one way to do that right now and the UX is getting pretty good too.

>a whole new universe of business models and revenue streams opens up.

Agreed. And there are loads of hi-speed, low-cost "coins".

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#622

Post by lima »

mhrmsn wrote: post #544
lima wrote: post #504

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's how it works in Europe (SEPA mandate) and it doesn't appear to be a problem. In Germany, very few people have credit cards, and mostly for online purchases. Everything else is done via direct debit. Fraudulent charges can be reversed just like a CC payment.

Are you talking about the Girocard (EC-Karte) system? Because there's also a lot of direct debit cards around that are all Mastercard/Visa branded. It's true though that using "real" credit cards is relatively uncommon.

Yes, Girocard. Much lower fees. EC card is actually an older system that isn't really used anymore but the name stuck :-)

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#623

Post by Glawen »

cycomanic wrote: post #103
philip1209 wrote: post #49

Fraud protection of credit cards is the root of modern e-commerce. In some ways, Visa and Mastercard are the privatized court systems of the internet. If I end up on a random, self-hosted ecommerce site and decide to make a purchase - what guarantee do I have that the item will show up or be as-described? If I bought something through a bank transfer, reversing that purchase would be incredibly difficult. And, suing…

As your post illustrates credit cards are really a solution developped for the deficiencies in the US banking system which have been exported to the rest of the world due to the dominance of the US market. 20 years when I was still living in Germany, hardly anyone had a credit card, while everyone was using automatic payments and electronic wiretransfers. I was very surprised when later (about 13 years ago) a US frie…

credit card was common in France since the 90s, nearly every shop took carte bleu/crédit card. Going to Germany is like going back living in cave, it is crazy to be told to get cash at the ATM in the shop for 1000 euros worth of goods in media markt (Stuttgart, 10 years ago, I hope you went bankrupt).

However I love cheque, it is still available in France and I use them regularly. You can actually use it to pay your shopping, it is accepted in a lot of shops. It is perfect to pay something by mail, or to pay sports clubs license. No need to request the IBAN, no need to type it and hope you didn't make a mistake, no need to confirm with 2FA using your secret code and no need to wait for the transfer to go through.

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#624

Post by nradov »

dfxm12 wrote: post #567
apeace wrote: post #558

Living in New York City, I've noticed that there are a whole lot of businesses that are either cash-only or card-only. I always understood the cash-only ones. If you can get plenty of customers who are willing to pay in cash, why would you want to pay credit card fees? The card-only ones were harder for me to understand, until I realized that handling cash costs money, too. Somebody needs to count it all at least onc…

The other side of this is that card only businesses de facto discriminate (not in an illegal way, of course) against people who don't have/can't get cards. Not being able to buy a cup of coffee from one particular coffee shop might not seem like a big deal, but it sends a signal as to who is/isn't wanted in the shop. Further, if it becomes a trend and all coffee shops go card only, spreading to other business like gr…

Who can't get a card? Anyone should be able to get a prepaid debit card, although it is a bit of extra hassle. Those work on the Visa / MasterCard networks, and are accepted by any business (except perhaps certain hotels and online services).

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#625

Post by HWR_14 »

saghm wrote: post #614
selectodude wrote: post #606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that. However you must accept cash to settle a debt. It's literally printed on every bill.

To be fair, writing on currency doesn't necessarily have to be legally binding. The bills also say "in god we trust", and yet I'm free to not trust in god and there are no legal consequences.

The writing on currency doesn't have to be. In this case it is. Or rather, the federal laws that back up that particular writing are.

In the US at least.

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#626

Post by nradov »

saghm wrote: post #614
selectodude wrote: post #606

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know that. However you must accept cash to settle a debt. It's literally printed on every bill.

To be fair, writing on currency doesn't necessarily have to be legally binding. The bills also say "in god we trust", and yet I'm free to not trust in god and there are no legal consequences.

You're missing the point. Under US federal law, if I owe you a $100 debt and I hand you $100 in cash paper money then I have settled the debt. You cannot then sue me, demanding to be paid via Visa or PayPal or whatever. But this applies to debts only, not purchases.

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#627

Post by nobody9999 »

jsmith45 wrote: post #591
nobody9999 wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The thing about debit cards though, it's a different system and they don't work for online payments which makes them effectively useless. Huh? That hasn't been my experience. At all. I make online purchases nearly (yesterday I made two!) daily with my debit card with no problem at all. Perhaps that's an issue where you live. I'm in the US, so YMMV, I guess.

In the US, Online purchases with a debit card generally do not use the lower fee debit card networks, but instead use the credit card networks. Basically every debit card in the US is co-branded by one of the credit card companies, and can be processed by merchants as if it were a credit card. The lower fee debit card networks operated by the interbank networks that run the ATM system (Pulse, NYCE, STAR, etc) do not…

>In the US, Online purchases with a debit card generally do not use the lower fee debit card networks, but instead use the credit card networks. Basically every debit card in the US is co-branded by one of the credit card companies, and can be processed by merchants as if it were a credit card.

Yeah. So what?

It doesn't make any immediate, practical difference to me.

Sure, it would be great if fees were lower. That would (presumably) reduce price increases over the long term and allow merchants to increase their gross profits. Having high "processing" fees is rent seeking at best and is likely a drag on the economy.

That said, GP's comment[0] (which is what my comment was addressing) that "The thing about debit cards though...they don't work for online payments which makes them effectively useless." is (at least in the US) flat wrong.

Edit: Removed extraneous editorializing.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32503287

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#628

Post by gretch »

causi wrote: post #574
apeace wrote: post #558

Living in New York City, I've noticed that there are a whole lot of businesses that are either cash-only or card-only. I always understood the cash-only ones. If you can get plenty of customers who are willing to pay in cash, why would you want to pay credit card fees? The card-only ones were harder for me to understand, until I realized that handling cash costs money, too. Somebody needs to count it all at least onc…

I wouldn't require someone to be able to provide change, but "accepting the currency of the nation you live in" seems like it should be one of the basic requirements of civilization.

I bought a house and was required to wire transfer the down payment. Would it have been reasonable for me to drop off a briefcase of cash? Was this transaction somehow unreasonable?

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#629

Post by n_ary »

lima wrote: post #504
Veliladon wrote: post #42

The only thing I don't want to happen is for the duopoly to be broken up into a billion different little fiefdoms each with their own unregulated space. One of the reasons credit cards are so good is because there's a fuckton of regulations built into the legislation behind them in order to give an individual consumer a fighting chance against the financial industry. All these fintech companies wanting ACH access to…

That's how it works in Europe (SEPA mandate) and it doesn't appear to be a problem. In Germany, very few people have credit cards, and mostly for online purchases. Everything else is done via direct debit. Fraudulent charges can be reversed just like a CC payment.

I think, I am living in different Germany, as for last 4-5 years, I only see oma/opa paying in cash. Everyone else carries one form or another of EC Karte or Debit Master/Visa. I rarely see some Gebuhrenfreis now and then, but most people have somekind of Debit ones.

Even certain kebab/doner shops located near bahnhofs now accept cards, but inner area ones are still cash-only. Most asian shops are generally cash-only sadly.

Re: Can the Visa-Mastercard duopoly be broken?

#630

Post by jjav »

lxgr wrote: post #529
jjav wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 3% of your credit card spend is a steep cost to pay for that security though You're not paying anything for the protections the credit card offers. Or more precisely, you are but we all are, even if you pay cash or with a debit card, since the vendor prices the items accordingly and there's no cash discount. (There are exceptions, but very rare in the US.) And most credit cards give you cash back so it's actually c…

> And most credit cards give you cash back so it's actually cheaper. Do you really think that banks and card networks work for free? Even if you use the best rewards card and never pay a cent of interest or fees to your bank, you can bet that the program on aggregate is running a profit for the issuer, or they would not be offering it in the first place. In effect, your rewards have to be either paid by the merchant…

> > And most credit cards give you cash back so it's actually cheaper.

> Do you really think that banks and card networks work for free?

They certainly don't work for free, I addressed that above.

The credit card fees the merchant has to pay are bundled in the price of each item, so you can't escape them. By using a cash back card you can recover some of it, so you're leaving money on the table if you pay by any mechanism other than a cash back card.

A few gas stations around here offer a discounted cash price. In those, I'll pay cash.

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