JEFFJAGUAR

Another loss for customers and the public.

jamar

So I take it this overrides state bans on surcharges? I'm still not going to frequent a merchant that does that unless there's absolutely no alternative or what they offer is far and away beyond what the competition offers.

Redhead

Yep.

+1 and I will leave my stuff right on the cash-register and raise a stink as I leave.

olddallas

Reading the article, I note that this is a temporary injunction by a single judge court in Manhattan applying to New York law only. The stated logic that is an infringement on the merchant's "perpetuates consumer confusion by preventing sellers from using the most effective means at their disposal to educate consumers about the true costs of credit-card usage" is utter nonsense. Merchants are free to post signs, or simply mention the credit card costs to their customers, and some do exactly that. However, merchants should be reminded that the benefits of accepting credit cards outweigh the costs as many merchants conveniently forget those. The state argued correctly that unexpected surcharges on top of advertised prices would be false advertising. If only that logic about unexpected surcharges could be extended to the phone companies, electric utilities, water utilities, cable and satellite TV companies, hotels, and the granddaddy of them all - hospitals.

cbn42

That is correct, all federal court decisions fall into that category until they are appealed.

Why is that the government's problem?

Agreed.

Another loss for Flyertalkers and the public.

jamar

And foreign visitors who would rather not be taken for a ride in the currency conversion process or have too exotic a currency to convert at most places (I met someone from Tajikistan who couldn't get his money converted, but his bank card was a Visa Debit), people who rely on prepaid cards with high cash withdrawal fees to get their pay, etc... Saying it only impacts Flyertalkers is missing quite a bit of the picture.

cbn42

So your motivation in opposing surcharges has nothing to do with the free trips and other rewards you get courtesy of your credit card at the expense of the merchants' other customers, but it's all about helping these poor foreign visitors and unbanked families who use prepaid cards. Riiight.

If your friend from Tajikistan had a Visa debit card, he could have withdrawn money from any ATM for a small fee. Even if he were forced to use his credit card and pay a surcharge, it would likely be less than any other method of currency conversion.

jamar

Well, since directly buying miles from places like US Airways is reasonably priced, easier, and fits my needs just as well, yes in my case. Also, with America's population as it is, there are lots of unbanked people out there who would probably not be happy- that industry wouldn't be as big as it is if the unbanked population is as small as you seem to imply it is.

JEFFJAGUAR

We have had this argument almost constantly throughout this thread. This law had no teeth nor was there much of an attempt to enforce it and I've complasined countless times to the NYS Consumer Division and have ben told I am right but there's nothing they can do about it.

What do merchants do? They simply call their illegal surcharges cash discounts. No matter how much rhetoric passes here, if I have to pay $3.60 a gallon for gas using a card and $3.50 using cash, I am being charged 10¢ more, an obvious surcharge even if the gasoline station owner trying to successfully get around the law calls it a cash discount. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder and one man's surcharge is another man's cash discount and that is the bottom line no matter how much fancy language is thrown out trying to justify it. And one can call me whatever name they wish. These are surcharges for using a credit card these so called cash discounts.

olddallas

I previously remarked that "merchants should be reminded that the benefits of accepting credit cards outweigh the costs as many merchants conveniently forget those."

cbn42 then asked
I would point out that cash heavy businesses increase the number of armed robberies which are a danger to public safety. The merchant doesn't really pick up those costs, employees and innocent bystanders are the victims. The true costs of one armed robbery can dwarf many years of credit card fees. Of course, more widespread use of debit cards as well as credit cards help reduce this problem. However, until debit cards get the same legal protections as credit cards, I will not be using one.

AA_EXP09

And maybe chips (both my HK and Canadian ATM cards have it...)

cbn42

That is a valid point, but there are public safety risks inherent in credit card transactions as well. Theft of financial information is just as serious an issue as robbery. A thief can potentially steal a lot more money from a gas station with a credit card skimmer than with a gun.

If you are proposing that the government ban credit card surcharges in order to reduce the risk of armed robbery, then how about businesses that only accept cash? Should the government mandate credit card acceptance as well?

Nick92

It just seems like judges and Justices invent constitutional rights out of thin air. So the First now protects a merchants right to surcharge? lol Hopefully SCOTUS won't agree with this.

AA_EXP09

Wouldn't the prepaid cards largely be debit cards?

olddallas

I would say that the government has a role in encouraging the use of credit (and debit) cards by leveling the playing field between card transactions (with an explicit fee borne by the merchant) and cash transactions where not all of the costs are borne by the merchant but are borne in part by the employees and bystanders who are subjected to a threat of violence and the public who must pay for the police to apprehend more armed robbers.

I would never mandate the use of credit or debit cards, and I get rather irritated when given a plastic card with unavoidable fees in lieu of a check (which happened on my last Oklahoma tax refund). This is why I think that the current laws strike a reasonable balance without the use of any mandate that merchants go about their business in any particular way.

As far as the many non-violent financial crimes involving credit cards, no innocent party is harmed by violence, and the credit card companies cover the losses out of the explicit fee. They also have departments that do most of the police work in finding the crooks.