XPost: rec.arts.sf.written, rec.arts.books
From: YourName@YourISP.com
In article , Robert Bannister
wrote:
> On 13/08/13 11:59 AM, Your Name wrote:
> > In article , Robert Bannister
> > wrote:
> >> On 12/08/13 11:23 AM, Rod Speed wrote:
> >>> "Robert Bannister" wrote in message
> >>> news:b6qu74F48beU5@mid.individual.net...
> >>>> On 11/08/13 11:13 AM, The Horny Goat wrote:
> >>>>> On Wed, 07 Aug 2013 22:33:50 -0600, Greg Goss wrote:
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> In the very early days, you could get the ATM card combined with your
> >>>>>> credit card. Thus you would use the credit card in ATMs and choose
> >>>>>> which of three accounts you're interacting with.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> With the rise of using your ATM card as a debit card for purchases,
> >>>>>> this feature was lost. Unlike at an ATM, the electronic pathway for
> >>>>>> using a credit card is quite different from that a debit card uses.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> You can still get those in Canada but they're devastating for the
> >>>>> merchant since debit transactions cost 12-15 cents each while if a
> >>>>> credit card depending on the type of card it can cost 1.6 to 4.5% of
> >>>>> the purchase. That's a huge chunk of the merchant's profit margin
> >>>>> particularly on the affinity cards and 'high spender' or points cards.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Now a merchant who doesn't cover all his costs is out of business so
> >>>>> you know where those costs get passed along to.... in grocery stores
> >>>>> they used to work on a 1-2% margin because they were getting 'the
> >>>>> turns' but these days it's 7-8% mostly to cover card costs.
> >>>>
> >>>> I don't know how much shop keepers get ripped off by the banks here,
> >>>
> >>> Its nothing like as high as that 7-8% here.
> >>>
> >>>> but I know that if they didn't accept transactions from saving
> >>>> accounts as well as from cheque accounts and credit, they would soon
> >>>> be out of business.
> >>>
> >>> Woolys and BigW don't in fact allow you to select
> >>> the Credit option with a debit card, and that hasn't
> >>> done them any harm business wise.
> >>
> >> I've never seen a debit card, but my MasterCard still comes up with the
> >> "Cheque, Savings or Credit" choice at Woolworths and BigW.
> >
> > That's the machine / software rather than your card - it does it for all
> > card types. If you try to use one of the other options the transaction
> > will fail (unless of course you've already set up that card to be able to
> > use a cheque or savings account). I'm pretty sure it happens on all the
> > machines I usewith my credit card, even though that has never been set-up
> > to use any other account type.
> >
> > You'd think that in these days of trying to idiot-proof everything, they
> > would take away unusable options. Presumably tap-n-go / wave cards use
> > some sort of default account type if they've been set-up to use different
> > ones.
>
> They are not unusable at all. Well, the cheque account one is because I
> don't have one, but I can still choose "Savings" or "Credit". They won't
> let me withdraw cash on credit, though - just pay my bill.
They're unusable if the credit card has not been set-up to access other
account types. Obviously at some point you must have set it up to access
your savings account (or at least the bank has, possibly it's a default
option and you have to choose not to allow it).
My credit card has absolutely no access to any other accounts (it can't
possibly have since they're a completely different bank), but the machines
still always offer the options of Cheque, Savings, and Credit. I've never
actually tried using one of the other options though.
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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