In theory, yes, but there is not any useful penalty for failure to comply, or so it seems. In any even there are a tiny number of protests so they could simply refund every protest and still make out extremely week on the deal.

In principle terminal certification and standards ought to protect consumers. In reality that does not always happen. The odd major international bank, a couple mentioned in this thread, do not maintain the regulatory/network releases up-to-date and often fail to provide for such issues as consumer notifications in language of card issue, which is not mandatory anyway. Thus one can have a notification in script that the consumer cannot recognise, for example, and still be technically in compliance. In DCC as in many other related topics YMMV.

It is too bad, isn't it, that nothing is really hard and fast in such issues?

While not enough on its own to justify the annual fee, this is certainly one nice benefit to the Amex Delta Gold....

Three CC transactions in Spain so far. All three got the DCC prompt but none of them asked me about it. Two charged USD, one was nice and charged EUR. One of the USD shops was a trashy souvenir joint but the other was a pretty friendly and helpful hostel. Honestly, I think there's some confusion about DCC on the side of the merchant as well, so it probably pays not to be belligerent.

How do I say "please charge me in Euros" in Spanish?

Went there last Oct with two HKD Visa cards, said "charge *Euros* please" as if we were speaking pidgin English (we're Chinese) and never got DCCed.

Even remember an instance in El Ingles Cortes where was DCC offered but the cashier already declined it before I could.

Funny thing. Last Saturday I swiped my CSP on a CCB machine in Beijing. At the bottom of the slip says DCC offer "[ ]Accepted" (seems like something un-ticked), and the amount shows "RMB:238.00". The cashier told me he hit "decline" for the DCC prompt.

However, Chase just confirmed that the transaction was actually DCCed. This is the first time I stepped on a mine while stepping into unknown DCC field (have been DCC free with ICBC and BoC Starbucks machines so far).

So there you have it. The slip, the machine, and the cashier can be that deceitful.

I will try to request a chargeback when the statement comes out. Before, Chase just refund me the difference. Here the difference being $1, I think Chase would do the same thing.

My wife has experience working with CCB and she had told me 建行 in Chinese has the same sounding of 贱人 (.....), and CCB has pretty .....y pricing scheme for banking services compared with other banks in China. Now I am a believer of that.

To teach those ....... banks a lesson, I am thinking of getting the new Wells Fargo Propel World card. The points of Wells Fargo means more to me than Delta Points, as I am sticking to *A.

The other option is AMEX Plat, right? It just doesn't make points at all...

AmEx Plat has Membership Rewards, and you can transfer 1:1 to Air Canada, ANA, and Singapore. I don't fly *A often, so I don't know how much a mile is worth in those programs. There is the rumor mill speculating that AmEx waiving FTF is the precursor to allowing DCC.

Por favor me cobran en euros. (from Google Translate; sounds about right from my dusty Spanish classes back in high school)

Agree. There's no policing on DCC in some parts of the world, namely, mainland China.

I dunno why Visa Inc/Mastercard International simply withhold payments to Mainland Chinese acquirers til they mend their ways. I doubt they do.


I don't think you can be sure the cashier was.

I think more likely the terminal is programmed to offer a choice, but select DCC no matter what you choose. I dunno how CCB can find programmers so cynical/twisted (running dog beaters?).

This illustrates Chip and PIN terminals can equally be non-compliant.

As with the EMV thing, VISA and MC aren't really effective at policing their own policies, especially when they are for profit corporations where their main motive is to make $$$ for their shareholders.

Withhold payments to Chinese acquirers and let Union Pay gain more market share, versus keeping a blind eye to the DCC issue so as to stay in the lucrative Chinese market, the answer is...?

In the back of my mind, there was a case I believe in Australia I think regarding surcharges on visa/mc cards where they were told it was a restraint of trade. I believe visa/mc are worried the same thing might happen if they tried to ban dcc. Besides, now that they charge for dcc transactions anyway, why should they care?

But now Australia has mandated that businesses can't charge unreasonable surcharges beyond the cost of doing business, which is about 1% for Visa/MC and 2% for AmEx. (I imagine large retailers are well below these amounts.) DCC as of now is unregulated. While the exchange rate isn't as bad as Travelex at the airport, it's almost never better than the Visa/MC rate. I would think Visa and MC would be opposed to DCC for similar reasons as surcharges because if customers knew they were getting ripped off they'd be far more likely to pay cash, especially for small purchases. A meal at your local fast food place that's charging 1% surcharge on top of the 4-5% DCC? No thanks. :td: Visa/MC don't want price discrimination based on form of payment. They want the price to be the same as cash price.

The reason the DCC scam works more consistently than a surcharge is due to customer ignorance. If people are told, "I'm going to charge you 3% to use a credit card," many switch to cash for small purchases. Just take a look at how many people pay the cash price in NJ at gas stations. With DCC, many customers and some merchants are unaware of the process. Customers might think it's "cool" that they're charged in their home currency, but they don't know they're getting duped on the exchange rate. If merchants were required to list the exchange rate compared to the Visa/MC rate then I think far fewer people would fall victim to DCC.

Here's another thought on why some allow themselves to be suckered by dcc. They don't have a clue at to how exchane rates work, they don't understand what the interbank rate is as opposed to the rates they are quoted by their banks or see in the window of the banks when they arrive. For argument's sake, let's say the interbank rate of the € is $1.40...they go to their bank, the customers who think they need cash, and are told they can buy euro (or sell dollars) at $1.54 for each euro plus exchange fees (or if there is no fee, it might be as high as $1.57 or so) so the bank can advertise commission free (in other words it's built into the rate). Upon arrival in euroland, they pass by a bank and see the bank is selling euro for $1.53 or so...so when they go in and the merchants tells them or the sales slip shows them they are being charged $1.50 for each euro and the clerk tells them it's a better rate than the bank pays, they fall all over themselves to save a buck or two little suspecting the official rate, the rate mc or visa w3ill charge them is $1.4014. And then to top it off, of course, if they're moronic enough to use a credit card from some near criminal banks like Citibank, Chase, BofA which have their cards for the serfs not paying asinine annual fees tagged with a 3% ftf, they still get socked for that fee even though the clerk is told to tell them an advantage of being dcc'd is no foreign currency fees. It's a sticky cycle of deceit and ignorance that allows this cancer to keep spreading throughout the tourist world.

I was in this category a few years ago. One of the reasons that brought me to FlyerTalk in the first place - the primary was checked luggage fees - was I was sick of being hit with 3% FTFs and $5 + 3% ATM transactions while traveling overseas. I got smart and ended up changing my card portfolio drastically. As a result I haven't paid many FTF or ATM fee in over 5 years. ^ (The only FTF fees I paid were on my AmEx Plat and Chase Marriott card for hotels, but both of these cards went 0% FTF in early 2011. I used a CapitalOne cash back card for small purchases, but now I use the Chase Sapphire Preferred for general everyday spend.) DCC has been more sneaky, and I got hit with it at the Venetian Macau (July 2011) and Frankfurt Marriott (March 2013).

I started this thread to help gain some traction around the issue. I had seen the China DCC thread, but I knew the issue was more widespread than in China, even if merchants in China are particularly egregious offenders in the DCC scam. As we both have mentioned, the biggest problem is customer ignorance of the interbank rate. A quick search online on your phone or that morning at the hotel can allow you to avoid ripoffs. I think far fewer people would accept DCC if the receipt had language noting the "surcharge" DCC often imposes. Consider the following example for a €75 purchase: "I accept the offered exchange rate of 1 EUR = 1.42528 USD for the convenience of being charged in USD. This exchange rate is 4% higher than the card issuer's rate of 1 EUR = 1.37046 USD which is a surcharge of 4.11 USD." In the rare cases where the DCC rate is lower than the Visa/MC rate, the customer could choose to accept DCC. I assume any online terminal that accepts Visa/MC has access to the Visa/MC exchange rate.

I'm not sure how lucrative it is, given mainland Chinese cannot apply for RMB-denominated V/M and even their USD V/M has to be paired with Unionpay.

The Chinese state will inflict pain to their own travelling populace by turning off V/M. Given they don't want to do things to piss off their middle class as of late I'm not sure that'll happen.