Originally Posted by
moondog
This evening, I ran into HSBC DCC (not so common in Beijing) at a cafe in 798. Since I didn't bring the cheat sheet with me, I ended up fiddling with the machine, and --when that proved fruitless-- calling HSBC with the merchant. The HSBC guy who answered the phone said:
1) there is no longer a work around
2) he didn't have a supervisor
Then, he hung up. We called back a second time and he repeated the same statements before hanging up again. (I ended up paying with a local credit card in the end.) This experience was disheartening to me because I increasingly get the sense that the banks are going out of their way to stack the deck in their favor.
Originally Posted by
moondog
After I finished editing my last post in order to provide my example, I reread the fine print on the HSBC receipt and the language is: 1) very different from what I've seen in the past; and 2) encouraging. I am not sure if this is new or not, but it seems that HSBC is not doing mandatory DCC at present.
Here's what it says:
-Select [x] transaction currency
<you are supposed to mark an "x" next to CNY or USD>
-tip in txn cur, total in txn cur
-no signature required
-default amount = CNY. Your choice is final. You acknowledge being offered a choice of currencies for payment. This service is offered by the merchant's service provider. No additional fee/commission is applied.
re possible post-signature amendments - aww...with this slip all one has to do is to mark an X. I can imagine HSBC staff going to merchants to take the slips being contested and adding the X before taking copies for representment.
re new slip - This slip looks like my
Global Payments slip in Taiwan. However, because it's a carbon slip, the terminal pauses to wait for my response - the cashier has to press "2" before the cardholder copy is generated.
moondog - you accessed the terminal after being given the first DCC slip right? Did the terminal ask for any input? If not, it's still defaulting DCC.
There's no way such a slip is generated,
no input is required and the machine will default local currency. In that case, the terminal will never DCC, and none of us here will believe any bank will design a terminal with DCC in mind but can never DCC.