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Merchants’ ‘victory’ over credit card fees will just complicate things more for them (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 3 months ago by Powderhorn@beehaw.org to c/finance@beehaw.org

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Want to buy a new shirt from your friendly neighborhood small business? In some cases, be prepared to pay out 2.5% more as a “financing” fee because you’re using a credit card. Enjoying that meal at the local diner? Better have cash or you could be subject to the same fee. Grabbing a bag of chips and a soda at the local convenience store? Oops … Unless you’re prepared to spend a minimum of 10 bucks you can’t use your credit card, sorry.

I’ve always been irritated by these practices. And I know I’m not alone. Who carries cash any more? Why are we, the customer, being shamed because we choose to buy something using what has become a standard form of payment over something that’s clearly a thing of the past?

Merchants have been fighting the credit card companies about these fees for years. And now they’ve won. This past week, Visa and Mastercard ended their battle, and now future fees will probably be lower for consumers that use some cards, particularly the ones that offer fewer rewards. But did these businesses really win? I’m not so sure. Be careful what you ask for.

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[–] t3rmit3@beehaw.org 11 points 3 months ago

This is some next-level simping for credit card companies under the guise of being on the side of small businesses. There's no actual concrete explanation of how this will be worse for consumers, just lots of "but do you really think fighting credit card companies won't turn out worse for you in the end?" fear mongering.

This author has some absolute crap articles, such as this one about not shaming companies for layoffs:

For starters, if you’re part of a layoff, please understand the situation. Employers lay off workers for a reason. It’s usually economics. No manager or business owner wants to lay people off. No one is hiring someone with the intention of firing them in the future. No one is happy about this. For a big business, a layoff could mean an adjustment in overhead. But for a small business – where every employee is critical – a layoff is probably much more serious. So please don’t be so quick to shame the company.

Bruh, please.

[–] megopie@beehaw.org 6 points 3 months ago

Honestly, paying less for not having my transactions monitored and tracked seems like a win in my book.

Hopefully it sets a president for standing up to amazon’s MFN status, and their extortion of sellers for “advertising fees” in their search algorithm being passed on to consumers who are being offered inferior products.

[–] Kissaki@beehaw.org 3 points 3 months ago

If you run a retail shop or a diner, isn’t it easier to just calculate how much the merchant fee costs as a percentage of your total revenues and then spread out a small price increase among all your products, where the impact would be barely noticed?

How would that kind of collection, calculation,and estimation be easier than a simple provider to cost association?

The suggestion is a subsidy to the more expensive providers at the cost of the cheaper ones. Make of that what you will.

Will a customer care if they’re paying $12.50 or $12.75 for a burger? No. Will they raise an eyebrow because you’re charging an additional fee on top of the entire bill because – gasp – they don’t use cash? Yes, they will.

Making cost and fees obvious doesn't sound to bad. It informs the consumer, with transpanency and opportunity.