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Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

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Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#271

Post by mrweasel »

Jommi wrote: post #263
raverbashing wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair the only place where I saw taxis accepting cards as a rule was NYC Practical, still a bit weary though especially without EMV readers

Go to any place in northern Europe and it's basically only card.

Denmark is pretty much only cards, but debit cards at this point, well above 80% for retail is card payments.

I normally have a few may 100 to 200DKK in my vallet, because the credit/debit card system do still fail. I haven't run into anything in the last few years where I could pay with card or mobile payment.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#272

Post by swiley »

smileysteve wrote: post #136
ashishb wrote: post #109

https://www.bostonfed.org/publications/public-policy-discuss... " On average, each cash-using household pays $149 to card-using households and each card-using household receives $1,133 from cash users every year. Because credit card spending and rewards are positively correlated with household income, the payment instrument transfer also induces a regressive transfer from low-income to high-income households in gener…

I don't buy this because it discounts the high costs of cash controls. Cash has high costs that likely make electronic forms of payment competitive. You have - Employees skimming the till; - Theft insurance for a safe, the nightly amount in the safe - Managers balancing the cash registers with change/safe - Armored trucks picking up the money (2-3 men guarding the transfer) - Banks processing the money - Employee tim…

I wouldn’t buy things with cash if there where a half way decent debit card or similar I could replace it with.

It needs to have real transaction authentication so I don’t have to deal with fraud and it needs to decline transactions when I actually don’t have enough money in the account (instead of charging $40 in fees.) That’s it, but no one seems to offer that so I use cash instead.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#273

Post by exabrial »

bit_logic wrote: post #169

This seems like a missed opportunity for Google Pay and Apple Pay. Before smartphones and NFC, it would've been too much for every merchant to make their own card, nobody is going to carry that many cards. But imagine if Target, Walmart, Best Buy, etc. made store cards and they all integrated with Google/Apple Pay. When a customer enters the store, the app could automatically pick the right card. Google and Apple jus…

Or just a new payment system in general, based on asymmetric cryptography and message signatures. I'd love to generate a key, enroll the key with my bank, and have them authorize transactions signed by said key. This would be similar to have you enroll an ssh key at GitHub.

The problem with the credit card number system is the lack of authentication. Anyone you pay with a credit card can take a picture of the numbers and go spend wildly online.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#274

Post by kasey_junk »

clan wrote: post #233
kasey_junk wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear that’s due to laws in Denmark that require its acceptance and granting it a particular monopoly status? I’d be curious what the issue rate between the Dankort & the Kroger Plus Card. It’s conceivable that Kroger has the market heft to do with selling power what Denmark did with law. As context Kroger employees about the same number of people as 1/10th of Denmark though I have no idea how that translates t…

Acceptance not required by law and no mandated monopoly. The card was introduced in 1983 and the law which helped the card stated that they could not charge any transaction fees to the consumer. It became popular with the consumers because there is no difference between cash and the debit card. It was popular with retail because it was cheap to handle. Consumers would typically get the card for free from the bank. If…

Who pays for the processing equipment? Clearing? Collection?

The banks were running it as a loss leader?

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#275

Post by mrweasel »

kitsunesoba wrote: post #71
lowpro wrote: post #26

I hate credit card fees as much as the next guy, but to be fair my credit card was the only way I could pay for things in Asia since I just lived there for 6 months. If I had used cash, the only ATM near me stole my friends debit card, and multiple people I know were robbed and pick-pocketed. My credit card insulated me from those risks, which I was fine paying an extra 1% for. Now that I’m back in America the risk i…

Yep. The US is reasonably safe in this regard, but I’ve had credit cards skimmed a handful of times. These cases were dealt with with little more than a quick call to custom service, but had it been my debit card that was skimmed, it would’ve been bad news. For this reason I carry only a small amount of cash (just enough for cash only bars/restaurants) and never carry my debit card. My primary payment method is credi…

Reasonably safe is relative. My bank here in Denmark recommends blocking your VISA or MasterCard upon return from the US, or simply have them issue you a new card for use on your trip.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#276

Post by PeterisP »

avip wrote: post #144
seszett wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think most countries have that. CB in France, Interac in Canada, Bancontact in Belgium, etc. But that concept sounds like it wouldn't fare well in the US.

Interac is for debit transactions only.

Outside of north america and UK the line between credit and debit is much more muddled - you may have "debit cards" attached to a current account that has a significant overdraft limit; you may have "credit cards" that have 0 credit limit and must be prepaid; and there's no major practical difference and no legal differences (unlike, say, USA).

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#277

Post by what-the-grump »

smileysteve wrote: post #136
ashishb wrote: post #109

https://www.bostonfed.org/publications/public-policy-discuss... " On average, each cash-using household pays $149 to card-using households and each card-using household receives $1,133 from cash users every year. Because credit card spending and rewards are positively correlated with household income, the payment instrument transfer also induces a regressive transfer from low-income to high-income households in gener…

I don't buy this because it discounts the high costs of cash controls. Cash has high costs that likely make electronic forms of payment competitive. You have - Employees skimming the till; - Theft insurance for a safe, the nightly amount in the safe - Managers balancing the cash registers with change/safe - Armored trucks picking up the money (2-3 men guarding the transfer) - Banks processing the money - Employee tim…

Not really. 2% on your gross is a lot and any standard commercial policy will cover cash on hand.

50% of the country is broke, 80% live pay check to pay check.

Many working minimum wage, low income bracket do not have bank accounts.

The idea that cash is ‘hard to operate’ is a stretch, we’ve been exchanging currency for as long as commerce existed. If you handle enough cash to need an armored truck, you are far above most businesses in processing.

There are a few places in NYC that do not take cash, and they exist in their own micro economy revolving around serving lunch.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#278

Post by eythian »

himlion wrote: post #238
llewey wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is definitely not true in Germany. There were many places that only accepted cash while I lived there. I just spent 2 weeks in Spain and there were many places I tried to eat that were cash ø ly. In Chinatown in London, as well, many places are cash only. "outside the US" is a big place, be careful to be more specific.

For a counterexample, in the center of Amsterdam many cafes / restaurants are card only.

At the same time, slightly outside the centre of Amsterdam many small takeaway places, hairdressers, etc are cash only.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#279

Post by pwg »

wcoenen wrote: post #242

A lot of problems would go away if all merchants (voluntarily or by law) explicitly charged their payment costs to the customer. Both for card and cash transactions, because cash handling isn't free either. The customers using high reward cards would then soon discover that they are just paying for those rewards themselves, and the free market would quickly push everyone to the most efficient payment systems.

> A lot of problems would go away if all merchants (voluntarily or by law) explicitly charged their payment costs to the customer.

At least in the US, the contract the retailer signs with the CC processor to be able to accept CC's explicitly bans passing the card fees on to the customer as a specific line item in the receipt.

Which really translates to the merchant increaseing their prices by 1.02x to compensate for the 2% (avg. estimate) fee the cards charge. So the customer still pays, but they do not directly see what part of the price goes directly to the payment network.

Re: Credit-Card Backlash Mounts as Kroger Weighs Expanding Visa Ban

#280

Post by mrweasel »

clan wrote: post #253
kalleboo wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Smartphone apps can be a game changer since they require so little infrastructure to adopt. Look at Venmo. In Sweden a banking revolution is taking place where an app similar to Venmo that instead was developed by a consortium of banks has quickly gotten mass adoption, recently also including at retail. I bought strawberries from a street stall using my phone.

The exact same is happening in Denmark. The huge players are under fire from new fintech startups. It has been amazing to see how fast such apps gain penetration in the market.

Honestly I can't think of a single fintech startup in Denmark that's is any competition to the banks and card companies.

The only two apps that really have any penetration is MobilePay, but that's the large banks, and eDankort, but that's NETS.

There are a fintech startups, but they all work with or for the large players.

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