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Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

zenobiapay.com

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Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#31

Post by victorbjorklund »

itake wrote: post #13
sampullman wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's ultimately in the price of goods, then it doesn't cost the consumer nothing, no matter how you spin it. It's just cleverly hidden. I think it's close to impossible to "fix" Visa without government intervention (e.g. limit fees to a fraction of a percent), but I'm still grateful to anyone who tries.

The price is the same if you use cash or card. Really, after reward points, card tends to be even cheaper. Visa/Mastercard/BNPL/Klarna etc. all have negotiated discounts for consumers, paid for by the merchant. I'm skeptical that merchants would lower prices (stepping away from $x.98, etc) instead of pocketing the higher margins themselves.

if all customers choose to us cash the merchant could lower price with 3%. If you are the only one paying cash then yes the price will stay the same.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#32

Post by frontfor »

vasco wrote: post #8
bruce511 wrote: post #5

When you start at the wrong premise, you typically end up in the wrong place. The premise is that credit cards (visa / Mastercard) is broken. When actually it works really well. For starters it works everywhere. Online. IRL. In my home country, in foreign lands. Secondly it costs the consumer nothing. The cost goes to the merchant. If anything the customer gets rewards. Merchants might pay 3%, (and ultimately yes, th…

> Secondly it costs the consumer nothing. The cost goes to the merchant. If anything the customer gets rewards. Sellers increase the price by the fee amount, savvy consumers with rewards cards can get back around 80% of that price increase, and regular non-credit-card-with-rewards holding consumers just subsidize the whole thing by paying the extra. It's a tax on people without rewards cards.

Still, most consumers don’t care or notice it (we are not most consumers), so this doesn’t refute the original argument.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#33

Post by Imustaskforhelp »

Tor3 wrote: post #28
sneak wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Secondly it costs the consumer nothing. The cost goes to the merchant. If anything the customer gets rewards. Just like tariffs, right? Visa/MC is a +1% income tax on most of the economy.

It isn't - using cards, with fees, is cheaper than cash. I realized that when shops started to refuse cash (even if cash is legal tender and they, by law, _have_ to accept cash). The argument? Cash is too expensive.

They only use cards because credit cards can allow them to get sales from people who wouldn't have been able to buy the product through debit itself, but they can buy it from credit.., so they are okay with eating 1-2% of costs in the fact that sale might happen and the companies will get 0.5-1% of it to you back as rewards (hopefully) and so there is incentive to buy using credit card for rewards but they might also give incentives of 1-2% if you buy through cash since they aren't eating that 1-2% cost.

And this whole network has now been built in such a way that now even debit costs the same charge just as network fees

Open sourcing this might be a step in good faith and I mean, we have UPI where I live and it has 0 fees and trust me its crazy good. I personally wish that either everybody in the world could use UPI or pixis from brazil.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#34

Post by Tor3 »

Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #30
Tor3 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't - using cards, with fees, is cheaper than cash. I realized that when shops started to refuse cash (even if cash is legal tender and they, by law, _have_ to accept cash). The argument? Cash is too expensive.

how is cash too expensive?? huh?

_Handling_ cash is expensive. I never thought of that until my SO started working in a shop. To and from the bank, with stacks of coins and notes.. and there's presumably much more than that for larger firms. In general I rely my statement on what merchants themselves are saying. Newspapers are writing interviews with merchants who (illegally) have stopped accepting cash, even though it's legal tender. "It's too expensive. It reduces our bottom line." That kind of thing. When I look around I see "Cards only" a lot of places.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#35

Post by frontfor »

chrismcb wrote: post #11
bruce511 wrote: post #5

When you start at the wrong premise, you typically end up in the wrong place. The premise is that credit cards (visa / Mastercard) is broken. When actually it works really well. For starters it works everywhere. Online. IRL. In my home country, in foreign lands. Secondly it costs the consumer nothing. The cost goes to the merchant. If anything the customer gets rewards. Merchants might pay 3%, (and ultimately yes, th…

It costs the consumers. Sometimes indirectly and sometimes directly. I would think that this is the primary motivation to come up with a new scheme.

It might be one motivation, doesn’t mean it’s a good one as per the original comment if consumers don’t care.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#37

Post by vasco »

frontfor wrote: post #32
vasco wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Secondly it costs the consumer nothing. The cost goes to the merchant. If anything the customer gets rewards. Sellers increase the price by the fee amount, savvy consumers with rewards cards can get back around 80% of that price increase, and regular non-credit-card-with-rewards holding consumers just subsidize the whole thing by paying the extra. It's a tax on people without rewards cards.

Still, most consumers don’t care or notice it (we are not most consumers), so this doesn’t refute the original argument.

If I take your money without you noticing it won't affect your immediate behavior, but later on you'll buy less stuff, specially if I keep doing it. If nothing else because you don't have it anymore.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#38

Post by Tor3 »

Imustaskforhelp wrote: post #33
Tor3 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It isn't - using cards, with fees, is cheaper than cash. I realized that when shops started to refuse cash (even if cash is legal tender and they, by law, _have_ to accept cash). The argument? Cash is too expensive.

They only use cards because credit cards can allow them to get sales from people who wouldn't have been able to buy the product through debit itself, but they can buy it from credit.., so they are okay with eating 1-2% of costs in the fact that sale might happen and the companies will get 0.5-1% of it to you back as rewards (hopefully) and so there is incentive to buy using credit card for rewards but they might also…

The argument doesn't hold - if cards were only about getting sales which they otherwise wouldn't get - and the part about "getting sales which they otherwise wouldn't get", is true enough - then there's no reason to refuse cash payments. That's additional sales, right? But the fact is that more and more shops refuse cash payments entirely. "Pay by card or go somewhere else".

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#39

Post by OutOfHere »

squigz wrote: post #36
OutOfHere wrote: post #22

[flagged]

How long have we been hearing that cryptocurrencies are going to save us from our existing payment systems?

I do not think most people are even slightly familiar with what transpired this year with regard to stablecoins. The biggest players that move money are going forward with it. This means Amazon, Walmart, and numerous other big players. They don't like paying credit card companies, and why should they. It's going to be a game changer.

Re: Zenobia Pay – A mission to build an alternative to high-fee card networks

#40

Post by jader201 »

eszed wrote: post #29
didibus wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying that even when I pay for something in cash or using debit, because of the possibility I'd use my credit-card the merchant had +3% their price?

Cash handling isn't free! You have to pay someone's time to count + reconcile + deposit it, or If you're dealing at any volume, you'll pay an armored car service to collect it. There's inevitably "shrinkage", or else business processes (more time and more overhead) to avoid it. Cash is king for hiding transactions and avoiding taxes. If that's the situation then I won't say you don't deserve a cut, but for rules-foll…

> but for rules-following merchants taking cash isn't any cheaper than paying the credit card fees.

That’s not true at all, particularly for large purchases.

If I go to an electronics and check out with $5000 in electronics, there’s no way that handling cash incurs the same expense to the store as the 3% fee ($150).

Maybe for nickel and dime purchases, but that’s rarely the case.

Even a $50 dinner doesn’t cost the restaurant $1.50 (plus the $0.30 transaction fee) just to handle cash.

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