50p charge for using Debit cards to be banned in January

Pawnless Endgame said:
I think he meant Rory Cellan-Jones, 'tech' editor for the propaganda machine.
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Not at all, I just happened to be in our security control room at work this morning when I noticed someone named Rory Dowie being signed in. The company he was being signed up to also fits with what dowie often posts about. Curiosity and all that.
 
Psycho Sonny said:
small shops get bent over on fees. it's stupidly high. it's all relative to your turnover.
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I've worked for card processing companies and I can assure you any small shop charging 50p on a typical transaction is making money, especially since they moved to a % fee for debit as well as credit cards.
 
Don't even see how this is an issue that needs to be regulated against, it's like 0.1% of shops that do this and you can still pay by cash, the shop owners aren't holding people up with a gun and saying you must pay by card and be bankrupted by our 50p charge.
 
Anyone been to Berlin? No one takes cards. Even a supermarket refused my MasterCard.
Backwards freaks.
 
Energize said:
Don't even see how this is an issue that needs to be regulated against, it's like 0.1% of shops that do this and you can still pay by cash, the shop owners aren't holding people up with a gun and saying you must pay by card and be bankrupted by our 50p charge.
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It's because you only find out when you go do pay. It is almost like listing incorrect prices.

Adding VAT on later for example, or a restaurant service charge not advertised in list prices would be more extreme examples.
 
Caged said:
Handling, storing and moving cash isn't free. This isn't card processing fee vs. no previous cost.
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You are right that the logistics of cash aren't free, however as it stands isn't cash simply more economical for small shops?

We need to look at more variables. Small businesses just don't operate in the same way as Tesco for example. For a small shop each and every sale is significant, having extra charges added to transactions as little as 40p is going to eat into your margins and you will feel it.

A massive chain like Tesco (which also happens to own something called Tesco Bank) can absorb a whole host of costs. They're not worried about per-transaction margins, they could get away with losing money on a thousand transactions it won't hurt and gets absorbed by the things that are making them profit, that's how companies as big as Tesco work. A small shop-keeper is thinking/worrying about his margins on each and every transaction.





The question is, are the current charges (the one that the card processors impose - not the 50p the corner shop is charging) a good deal? Is it a fair price we are paying? Is it value for money?

Because with cash, you need to employ the people who handle the cash, it's manual and there are jobs involved.

But with a card processing terminal, I think a per-transaction fee is unacceptable. There is no extra cost for authenticating a digital funds transfer on a system which is already autonomous. There's a cost to install a terminal, and to maintain the back-end systems, but the transactions/authentication itself is fully autonomous, therefore it's silly for them to get a PERCENTAGE cut of each transaction.

There should only be a small line rental fee, and I don't see why it should be anything more than £10 per month. Look at BT's line rental, they have to run a nationwide data transferring network. It's like BT charging you extra everytime you open spotify.


The actual transaction value is completely meaningless to a card processor. The EXACT same process occurs whether it's a 1 penny transaction or a £1000, so how on earth can they take a percentage cut of each transaction separately, even if it's 0.0001, it's wrong. It defies the laws of mathematics.
 
Nobody is being banned from remaining cash-only, they just aren't allowed to charge a card surcharge. If a business doesn't feel that accepting card payments is worth the increase in size of the potential market then they don't need to take cards.

If you feel you can run a card payment service for a flat rate and remove the per-transaction charge then give it a whirl - you will likely make a fortune.

There also doesn't seem to be any mention of a minimum spend before being prepared to process a card payment, it only covers surcharges.
 
Many shops local to me refuse card under a certain amount. What annoys me is when I offer to pay 50p or £1 to cover the 'charge' and they still refuse. Why would a business refuse me offering to pay a payment and also making profit on the item I buy, it seems absolutely bizarre.
 
rIcK said:
Many shops local to me refuse card under a certain amount. What annoys me is when I offer to pay 50p or £1 to cover the 'charge' and they still refuse. Why would a business refuse me offering to pay a payment and also making profit on the item I buy, it seems absolutely bizarre.
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Because they probably dont want to pay VAT.

Rather you use a cash machine or remember for next time.

Larger purchases they probably won't get away with always demanding cash.
 
suggestions welcome! said:
Not at all, I just happened to be in our security control room at work this morning when I noticed someone named Rory Dowie being signed in. The company he was being signed up to also fits with what dowie often posts about. Curiosity and all that.
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ah I thought it was something related to my comment, which confused me a bit as I didn't think what I'd posted was controversial

(might have been better to ask if I'd been in X building today rather than post this bloke's name though)
 
muon said:
It's because you only find out when you go do pay. It is almost like listing incorrect prices.

Adding VAT on later for example, or a restaurant service charge not advertised in list prices would be more extreme examples.
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It's nothing like listing incorrect prices, it's a one off fee on the entire transaction if you choose a specific payment method, and even then you're under no obligation to then go through with the transaction.

Ace Modder said:
i had to buy a bag from argos last week AFTER I had already bought the items I wanted. They said it was 5p and as I didnt have cash, i paid on card - what is the fee for a 5p transaction? because 0.02% is 0.1 of a penny?
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The fee is capped to 0.2% of the average debit card transaction.
 
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Energize said:
It's nothing like listing incorrect prices, it's a one off fee on the entire transaction if you choose a specific payment method, and even then you're under no obligation to then go through with the transaction.
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That is exactly the same. You also have no obligation to go through when other charges are added. However it is misleading and putting the customer in a position they may pay any extra fees even though they wouldn't have to begin with.

It is why prices must be advertised correctly to begin with.
 
muon said:
That is exactly the same. You also have no obligation to go through when other charges are added. However it is misleading and putting the customer in a position they may pay any extra fees even though they wouldn't have to begin with.
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I don't see how deliberately listing incorrect prices or illegally listing prices excluding vat is comparable to charging a tiny fee to cover the cost incurred as a result of customer choosing to pay by card.

The fee structure is often a fixed amount plus a % based on the value of the transaction, it would be far more confusing to list those charges next to the product prices.

It is why prices must be advertised correctly to begin with.
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They generally don't. The price indicated is an invitation to treat.
 
Psycho Sonny said:
he isn't overpriced compared to other corner shops. he is overpriced compared to supermarkets who's daily turnover is 1000 times what his is.

you do know what economies of scale is?

he will be making less profit on each item than the supermarkets even with those high prices. he then has to pay transaction fees which are much higher than the supermarkets.

all this means is less profit for shop owners. expect to see them increase their prices to compensate.
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Then why is the corner shop 60 seconds up the road who sells the same stuff cheaper? and also only charges 50p per transaction? Don't talk to me as if you know when clearly you don't know the shop and how he works his business.
 
Some of these corner shops are right proper gold mines and most don't pay their tax either as most of the cash goes into their back pockets. And the ones that do even employ staff for a few hours here or there is usually just cash in hand too. So yes they should absorb the card fees.
 
And Just Eat are a horrible company hope they burn when they can no longer charge the 50p for using a card. Most takeaways charge more on their menus on Just Eat to start with and Just Eat do nothing about it when you tell them even though it's their policy not to charge more than the shop menu. The reason being because Just Eat are making more commission on the increased prices.
 
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