221–230 of 267 posts
Pay cash, moron. That's how we roll in Europe.
I relied heavily on a bank card when I lived in France a decade ago. Has Europe regressed?
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> This is what pays for the Olympics even occurring Even conservative estimates of the final cost of the Olympics are around 10bn. Visa paid only 100m so I think the games would have been fine without them.
40% of the Olympic costs are funded by The Olympic Partner (TOP) program, of which Visa is a charter member. I was making a general statement about exclusive sponsorships making the Olympics possible, not Visa alone.
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He wasn't asking 'why sponsor the olympics', he was asking 'why take the exclusive angle'. Saying 'they've been doing it for years' does not answer that.
Saying "they've been doing it for years" implies that it probably works. That is the answer (well okay, it's his answer)
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It won't go bad after this day.. (but theft is a valid point)
If you don't live in the UK, having a fistful of sterling when you get home is not really the ideal situation. It's not far from it going bad, in a sense.
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It won't go bad after this day.. (but theft is a valid point)
It really depends on the currency. The odds of Euros, say, going "bad" on a scale of months to years are fairly nonzero. Similar for currencies with high inflation rates.
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Not in the UK... most of our debit cards are Visa or MasterCard
Same in Sweden as well.
This is a direct pay solution used with online terminals, the Visa/MasterCard-part of your debit card is just for offline transactions or credit.
Although I agree it's annoying and negative marketing, it's also being completely overblown here. This stuff is just a minor marketing gimmick. Paying with credit card is in itself rare in most of the world outside the US, where debit cards and cash are way more common. My guess is, 95% of all locals and non-US visitors automatically pay with cash and don't even notice the Visa-only signs. Not having the local curren…
> Paying with credit card is in itself rare in most of the world outside the US I live in the UK: You're incorrect. I would say credit card payments make up the majority of transactions (exceptions: buses, market stalls, and Greggs).
I've been having enormous trouble understanding the thinking behind the "We are proud to only accept Visa" marketing campaign. I simply can't understand how it could be viewed positively by any consumer - it's such an obviously anti-customer thing to do. I've been trying really hard to understand why Visa would make such an obviously unfriendly and counter-productive decision. The only theory I can come up with is th…
Consumers learn something crucial from this marketing campaign: that American Express and certain other credit cards are NOT accepted by some merchants, so it's a good idea to get and always carry a Visa card -- by implication, the only card accepted everywhere.
I had two Visa cards that I couldn't use, so frustrating.
EDIT: typo
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The problem is that everyone know that other cards are accepted everywhere apart from the olympics, or at least Mastercard is. This is more like BMW deciding to sponsor the construction of a road and only allowing their cars to pass.
In a rural town in the UK I tried to get some money of my Mastercard on a Visa-branded machine. Didn't work. A friend tried with a Visa card and that worked like a charm. It sounds more like a common practice in the UK. Denmark had something similar with Visa as well. Apparently it works since I am now very likely to get a Visa-card next to my Mastercard for those just-in-case situations.