Originally Posted by
mikesyr18
That's not the history of the AMEX business model, sorry. That is why AMEX used to have a very loyal following of high spenders. If you're saying the reduced merchant fees will have those results, I've pointed that out many times already.
No, I'm not saying that it will have that effect. I'm saying since it's the merchant being charged, not you, your logic is flawed since you're basically saying since they charge
someone else more, they should give
you better service and that reducing the amount they charge
someone else will give
you worse service. This doesn't logically follow. At all.
Originally Posted by
mikesyr18
Again, missing the point. Since AMEX is already accepted at 65ish percentage of merchants, adding 30% more merchant acceptance won't matter that much if you're reducing your revenue significantly from the other 65%.
But Amex
isn't accepted at 65% of merchants. Not by a long shot. I found it ironic that travelling in the US, Amex acceptance was
worse than Australia. And the reason for that is likely due to the much higher merchant rate charged to merchants. Here, Amex has an absolutely rabid following of customers, and a very healthy acceptance rate. With a much lower merchant fee (as long as you pinky swear promise not to surcharge more than you do Visa or MasterCard). This is doubly so with small businesses, where Amex charges easily
half the merchant fee as they do in the US (1.5%) - and yet not a single devaluation of MR or customer service in sight.
Originally Posted by
mikesyr18
There's no "merchant fee" for the Green Card. The store's vendor negotiates a lower price if the merchant does enough transaction volume.
What are you talking about? Of course there's a merchant fee - they're not going to give you 0%.
Originally Posted by
mikesyr18
And nobody applies for an AMEX and expects a high acceptance rate at merchants... Only a fool does that.
No, the foolish thing is expecting a publicly traded company to pass up revenue/profit. Amex does indeed benefit from their brand recognition, and their premium brand perception, but they also target
high spenders. You can't be a high spender if you can't spend (and, in case you weren't aware, Amex has actually declared an intent to match Visa/MC card acceptance by the end of FY19 - that's not going to be an easy goal if they intend to charge 3% per txn).
Originally Posted by
mikesyr18
But again, you came here to destroy a civil discussion, so if you expect me to carry on a conversation with you, you might not want to use the words "hogwash" and "first of all," next time.
Ah yes, accusing those of disagreeing with you of coming here to destroy the discussion is totally civil. Pot, kettle, black.