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Comment by kzrdude | Hacker News Reader

It's entirely bullshit that they keep your credit card info and can charge you at their whim. It's another reason that payment type needs to be abandoned.

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as someone who has had a proper merchant account in the past, my impression is that the customer has a lot more power than the merchant, when it comes to chargebacks. Chargebacks are super damaging to the owner of the merchant account[1], and while you can fight them, and sometimes win, my impression was that at least as a small operator, the end-user had the benefit of the doubt.

I'd bet money that "we made some ridiculous claim to be able to charge you after the fact for doing something reasonable" wouldn't hold up against the chargeback.

This is the thing; in most countries, America included, 'freedom of contract' is constrained by many laws, including 'reasonableness' tests. Personally, I think this is a feature, not a bug.

[1]chargebacks are one of the things that changes how much 'reserve' the merchant account holds back... if you don't have great credit, and/or if you have chargebacks, sometimes the merchant account will hold your money for months before releasing it to you. You really want to avoid chargebacks, as a merchant.

Concur. The only chargebacks I've ever won are when the customer admits something incriminating in an email, or claims "item not received" when they signed for it.

"Item not as described" is a huge loophole to get whatever you want for free. Hopefully the card issuers track repeated abuse. The banks don't even ask for proof the item was returned. Amex is particularly brazen if you want to steal free products.

Isn't the simplest option to cancel the payment with the credit card company, in case they charged more than what was on the bill?

Why would that help? By the time you know it's too late, and they can always send debt collectors after you.

This is terrible for a hotel. Charge back % spikes is a great way to get dropped by a credit card company.

Mastercard is not going to drop Marriot because some manager got a little overzealous with his directive to make sure his franchise has good reviews.

You would be surprised. I've issued chargebacks before after offering every chance for an issue to be resolved with major firms (over the phone) and within 10 minutes of making a chargeback I got a call from the head office offering all sorts of things to remedy the issue. It doesn't take many chargebacks for a provider to can even very large accounts.

The payment processor can drop the client or increase the fees. MasterCard doesn't care that you are the Marriot if you have significant amount of frauds, significant meaning one percent or two.

True, but whoever handles the contract on Marriot's side is going to become extremely aware of a sudden spike in chargebacks and where they happened in short order.

It is possible, actually, if a certain percentage of their credit card charges result in chargebacks.

Chargebacks are an easy countermeasure. Costs them a $30+ fee plus time expended to challenge it. And, if it succeeds, it is perfect evidence for any suit the hotel brings.

What happens if you check out and then someone finds you've trashed the room?

This is what insurance, credit and contract law are designed to handle.

Like the contract you presumably signed that says in the event that your room was damaged they can charge your credit card?

What happens if you check out and you’ve already canceled your card by the time they try to charge you for trashing the room?

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