I would think that they would check your passport to make sure you are a foreigner. Otherwise, any local resident could go to the bank and get some foreign currency to avoid the tax. But at any rate, since the hotel needs to specify the amount of the charge to the terminal before swiping a card, I don't think DCC would matter. The employee will probably decide whether you are eligible based on your passport or the appearance of your credit card.


I think that's the bottom line. Most parts of the US get few foreign visitors relative to the local population, compared to many other countries. However, that doesn't explain why merchants at airports and such haven't implemented DCC yet. Perhaps the acquirers don't find it feasible from their perspective.

But one of these cities doesn't have DCC at the airport. :D

Surely you went to the good parts of LA :D

Chicago's city center (I mean the part inside the loop) is quite nice. But just like LA, if you venture out, you can run into every sort of trouble, especially if someone goes south...

NYC on the other hand has more troubles in the center...

Melbourne Airport has DCC, I clearly remember.

London is quite nice that I've only encountered DCC a couple of times.

I doubt if DCC is implemented in the US, there would be any "scam" like practices like one can find in Ireland or China. It's like looking for legal trouble dead-on in a everybody-suits-everybody country...

The info we need to look at might be that how many acquirers there are in the US. For example in Australia, usually the acquirers are those big banks, so the number is limited. But if there are so many acquirers in the market, implementing DCC by one acquirer might not cover that many foreigners.

That's right on both accounts. I feel like a lot of this DCC behavior practiced in other countries would be ripe for a big class action lawsuit in the US (plus would even include those people who had made a purchase in the US with DCC and thus been passively ripped off.)

I don't have any data on acquirers, but it probably isn't like HK where you only seem to have Hang Seng, Global Payments, and Citibank. (...plus only a few others?)

I have never been to a place in the US where shopkeepers or bartenders will try to rip off tourists by overcharging compared to the real price. Sure, there are overpriced tourist traps, but they are overpriced for everyone.

On the other hand, overcharging tourists common practice in parts of other countries.

So, I think that you have this completely backwards.

If that's not common practice where you are we must live in two totally different Americas...

I saw the same terminals at DFS at SFO today as in GUM with the same 3% rate offered:

http://i.imgur.com/MbJo7Dnt.jpg

The interesting thing is that they have both the PRC and ROC flags there, but the characters for the ROC flag are simplified. :D

Since I had a USD card there was no DCC offer, but I imagine opting out would be simple like it was at HKIA. Two flags appear on the screen and you pick the one you want. You have full control over the selection, and it's fairly non-coercive as far as DCC offers go.

BTW, contactless won't prevent DCC, at least for Visa cards:

http://i.imgur.com/K6bGRe7.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/KHrmntG.jpg

But doesn't there have a to be a signature/PIN entered somewhere for DCC to take place? I think for contactless without a signature/PIN for a small purchase DCC isn't allowed. Otherwise, in a dispute, how can you prove that the cardholder opted in to DCC?

What a totally retarded thing it is..

Contactless is especially designed for fast purchases. I can pay contactless for 1$ (or, better say, 1.37$) which makes the process much faster than paying by cash. But have me trying to evade DCC will take couple seconds - giving me annoyed faces by other customers (and making it less probable that I'll use card next time) and eventually have me using just one single card for my purchases: Amex

Visa and Mastercard really seem to have one single target: Making Amex stronger with their retarded "lets scam the customer" ideas..

Apparently that's satisfied with a checkbox.

http://i.imgur.com/A74Q6AT.jpg

DCC general requirements:

http://i.imgur.com/hp5UnlM.jpg

This was mentioned a while ago, but I found out today that this is exactly what Uber does if you take a ride in a country other than your card issuing country. I took an Uber ride home from PVG airport and while the Uber receipt showed I was supposed to be charged 350 RMB it said in fine print "this transaction will be processed in USD". It just showed up on my AmEx as being processed from the US at a very good (0.1% off mid-market) exchange rate, neatly side-stepping the FTF my Costco AmEx charges.

Now THAT is a DCC rate I can get behind.

I saw Uber being promoted in my annual Shenzhen mattress run (Westin Nanshan this year) but I'm curious how they can collect from the customer outside China.

In this case, what is to prevent a dual USA (replace with any other nationality that allows dual nationality)/Chilean national from using their foreign passport from also avoiding the tax?