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Comment by eastendguy | Hacker News Reader

Why is Germany (the state) "anti credit card"? It is accepted everywhere.

You might mean that some Germans don't like CC and prefer cash for privacy reasons. But that is a personal decision.

>It is accepted everywhere.

Not in my experience in the least bit. Germany was the only place that I’ve been where there were so many non-credit card restaurants etc. I was traveling for work in Bavaria and baden-württemberg. It was an issue and we had to make sure I selected the right place to use my work cc.

I took some personal time in Munich and most of the places I went were cash only. 2 students, one from Finland another from the Netherlands complained about the cash issue and forgetting it multiple times. Leading to interesting situations.

Strange, I'm living in Germany, hailing from Baden-Württemberg and now been living in Northrhine-Westphalia for almost ten years, and I cannot remember a single restaurant that doesn't accept credit cards. And I'm paying almost everything with credit card.

Sure, the ice cream stand at the swimming pool only accepts cash, as does the local discotheque, but restaurants? Never a problem.

As a foreigner who lived in Germany for several years until recently, my experience is also that cards were accepted at 50% of places at most - often with a minimum purchase, and usually no contactless.

By contrast, in New Zealand even most farmer’s market stalls and pop-up espresso carts presume that contactless will be the main means of payment.

Munich was much worse. 3 lunch cafes, coffee shop, bar, and one of the beer gardens. Luckily I was warned and asked the places before I went.

Even the cab to the Munch airport would only accept cash. I had to walk across the airport to get it. His payment app was “not working”.

In Stuttgart it was only the smaller places. Although we made sure find places that took corporate Amex using a website.

Your problem was most likely using an Amex. Amex is accepted nearly nowhere in Germany.

No it wasn’t. I wasn’t working when I was in Munich and not using my Amex.

It's basically the opposite in Sweden, if you don't have a credit card but just cash, you will at least in Gothenburg where I work go hungry during lunch.

When it is the majority of the population, it is beyond a personal decision.

This is just my personal observation. Among the western European countries, German has the smallest level of adoption of credit cards. The French, the Dutch, the Swedes etc love their cashless nature of credit cards, the Germans not so much.

Furthermore most of the credit cards offered by the German banks are actually debit cards.

When it is the majority of the population, it is beyond a personal decision.

It boggles my mind, but "majority" of the German population has a preference to Currywurst ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Currywurst ) - is this also "beyond a personal decision" ?

If you have a reference to German government pursuing an anti credit cards policy - please provide it here.

Curry wurst is definitely a cultural thing. Most kids growing up in Germany eats curry wurst, and continues to eat them in adulthood.

This paper (0) is a good write-up on how the card systems works in Germany.

(0) - https://refubium.fu-berlin.de/bitstream/handle/fub188/22957/...

edit:updated the link

The link doesn't work?

Thanks for the link, it is indeed very good.

A debit card is just as cashless, what is your reason for using a credit card?

Hotels or car rentals which want to block a certain amount on my card as guarantee are one. Other than that I never needed a credit card.

In case of an emergency most bank accounts in Germany can go into the negatives, I guess making minimum payments on a credit card is cheaper but that style of life isn't at all common in Germany.

No sure why people are downvoting me for this.

But let me just say that, when I was at Square this was common knowledge and why that wasn't the first market we looked at.

I'd wager that about 90 % of "credit card transactions" in Germany are actually Girocard transactions. Virtually every bank card is a Girocard.

Depending on your bank, it's quite the opposite, particularly when you want to draw cash from an ATM.

With a Girocard, you have to go to a specific brand of bank or hope they are in your "cash group" or else you will pay a hefty fee.

But some banks offer to withdraw from any ATM using their VISA CC with no fees at all.

For years I've been using this to get cash without much of a hassle and pay for stuff I'd otherwise probably pay for with my Girocard.

Makes me wonder if my cash withdrawals are counted as CC transactions?

That should be easy to figure out by looking whether the transaction shows up in the checking account or in the credit card account.

The money is taken from the CC account, so I guess that would make it a CC transaction when I draw money to pay in cash? That's kinda funny lol

Most of these "credit cards" in Germany aren't really credit cards though. They take the money from your account immediately instead of sending you a monthly statement and letting you decide how much you want to pay towards your credit.

In general they are debit cards, yes, and I think that everyone means is debit or credit cards or equivalent.

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