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Comment by dannyw | Hacker News Reader

If both Visa and Mastercard refuse to deal with you, you are basically screwed in today's world.

Given the now multi year heavily covered role of payment processors in policing the boundary between sex work and abuse I’m surprised payment is so far down the list in these comments. In the news this month:

- https://www.cnbc.com/2022/08/02/bill-ackman-blasts-visa-sayi... - https://thehill.com/policy/technology/548279-mastercard-upda...

Getting deplatform by payment processors is existential. Also, of note, they are just the front door to a banking system that is generally necessary for commerce and yet under similar pressure to police:

- https://www.marijuanamoment.net/marijuana-banking-reform-wil... - https://www.aba.com/advocacy/our-issues/cannabis

Perhaps nether is as salient as the news cycles devoted to SWIFT and the norming power that exclusion form it was sure to demonstrate.

- https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60521822

(Specific links are arbitrary pointers into the issues referenced)

And then you have articles like this:

https://sweden.se/life/society/a-cashless-society

Where I am really not sure how to feel about it.

The Swedish Central Bank is investigating a eKrona, which would be a state-backed digital currency.

I'm living in Sweden, have no problems with a cashless society in theory, but that it's all in the hands of private corporations definitely makes me unhappy.

Maybe in States, but not in the majority of the world. Definetly not in Europe.

There are plenty of European parts where you cannot rent a car or book a hotel without visa or mastercard.

Meanwhile, for a business, either of these refusing to work with you will likely kill the business on the spot.

The differences between Europe and US corporatism is petty narcissism of small differences.

> book a hotel without visa or mastercard.

Maybe major chains. There are vast numbers of small-holder rentals that happily take cash.

> Meanwhile, for a business, either of these refusing to work with you will likely kill the business on the spot.

It's 100% possible to do business in Europe purely with bank transfer. I've been at it for years and I never interact with either Visa or Mastercard.

small business, sure. big business, no chance.

You are missing the point.

Yes, there are transactions that occur in cash, bank transfer & such. Fail to present a Visa/MC when you rent a car in Dublin or Brussels and you will be in for a surprise. In Dublin, standard practice is to compromise by making you pay a 5X rate... insurance or whatnot. Maybe there is a no-card option somewhere in the city, but it certainly isn't most places.

Yes, you can be an electrician or consultant without accepting cards. No, it is not practically possible to run a store or most customer facing businesses. Even most electricians and consultants accept or at least use cards.

There's no meaningful difference between Europe and the US. This is a powerful and hard to avoid duopoly.

There is a major difference: VISA and mastercard offer credit cards. Not many people use credit cards in Europe, they are all debit cards. Most stores I know do not accept credit cards at all, you have to have a debit card. You can easily refuse someone credit and scrap their credit card. It is a lot harder to deny someone access to their savings.

Most international (and even local only) european debit cards are owned or serviced by Visa and Mastercard. A store isn't denying people either Debit or Credit. It's only denying them bananas & laundry detergent.

This is totally tangential, but I would actually argue that denying someone access to their credit is not that different. Credit is what money is. Our European attitudes towards debt and credit is intensely responsible for our two tier system. Credit for the rich. Debit for the poor. Policy debate about where and how the border between these two should be.

I wonder if it differs across Europe. In the UK at least, you are very right. Debit cards run via the visa and mastercard networks and every store that accepts debit cards also accept credit cards.

German banks are stubbornly clinging to their Giro cards, much to the inconvenience of iPhone users. The cards are usually Maestro-compatible, but domestic transactions use the domestic system.

I'm sure the privacy aspect of it must be very tricky; Apple collects a lot of information when using Apple Pay, and I can imagine that German banks might be hesitant to share such granular details.

Here in NL Apple Pay works fine with a lot of banks -- and they're still just Maestro cards.

I suspect that it's related to the high degree of decentralization. Sparkasse and Volksbank are each federations of hundreds of independent local credit unions. You can do business with them if you accept that the standard interchange fees and conditions are set in stone, but if you want preferential treatment, you need to negotiate with every local member bank individually.

I'll go out on a limb and assume that the standard fee structure does not afford wallet manufacturers a per-transaction fee.

I think the point being made is about banned by your region's major payment processing corporations, not specifically Visa or Mastercard.

Any statement about a "majority of the world" would need to apply to India, China, and the African continent to be true. In China being banned from Alipay or similar would presumably have the same or even worse effect. India's attempt to go cashless some years back disproportionately affected those without plastic or digital payment cards, further emphasizing the point.

I don't know too much about payment systems in Africa but my understanding is that mobile payment services have been heavily adopted and if a major payment corporation in the region banned an individual it would have a drastic negative effect on their livelihood. If corporate-issued payment devices are easy to do without in Europe it would seem to be the exception, not the rule.

> Definetly not in Europe.

Denmark and probably other Scandinavian countries almost never deal with cash any more. Everything is by card (Visa) or MobilePay (an app connected to your card)

If the card would stop working you would have a hard time.

When you pay by card in a Norwegian store, you probably use a card that supports BankAxept (since 1991). In that case the payment will be made through the banks, instead of through Visa. 3 of 4 payments go through BankAxept.

Cards issued by banks will often combine BankAxept and Visa/MC on the same card, so that users don't need a separate Visa card. The terminal will switch to BankAxept if available automatically. This is done transparently, so there are no issues with using it as a Visa card outside Norway.

As a Swede, why don't we have this, it's a good solution for customers and merchants.

There are still some fees involved of course, but they are much lower and typically a fixed price. One article I read says that BankAxept is cheaper than Visa for transactions over 30 NOK (~3 USD), but the information may be out of date.

I realize that what we have in the EU is some regulation to put caps on the fees. It's better than it used to be.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/EN/legal-content/summary/fees-for-...

Thankfully, there is initiative for digital euro: https://www.ecb.europa.eu/paym/digital_euro/html/index.en.ht...

In Sweden we are super reliant on digital payments and a lot of stores don't even accept cash any more. Most people don't carry cash only digital payments. This simplifies for the stores/restaurants and maybe decreases the risk of handling larger amounts of cash. I love the simplicity of digital payments and not having to bother with change and such. We even have an app called Swish (set up by Swedish banks) that does free money transfer between people and can also do payments to stores.

Every once in a while some pensioner organisation or so starts a debate about them not understanding how to pay their bills via an app and that they can't shop at some stores/restaurants only taking payments via an app (Swish). Some seniors might not have a smartphone or are unable to use it.

But the real and much bigger issue is what happens in case of a crisis. Like a huge power outage or the rolling blackouts that might come this winter depending on how the power situation develops in Europe. Or in case of natural disaster or war. We have historically had a very stable power grid and society so most people don't even think about what they would do if their digital payment methods just stopped working. I don't think it benefits our society that we are unable to make payments without technology.

No, VISA has recently managed to kill Maestro and is taking over. Even the Swiss post bank is now issuing visa debit cards instead of the previous Postfinace cards which only worked in a limited number of ATMs.

Also, Maestro is a Mastercard brand.

In Switzerland it's still possible to buy things online and pay by an enclosed invoice. Twint is a local digital payment system and it is universally accepted, both online and offline.

Twint takes 2% from vendors. This is also why you can't generate a code to have your friend pay you but instead have to enter their phone number since those transactions are free.

In 1-2 years we will have instant IBAN payments, I wonder how long until there is a fee for that as well which is currently free just takes a day.

The EU has a right to basic bank account and debit card. Visa or MasterCard cannot refuse.

That right is not absolute, payment providers can reject you based on laws regarding money laundering and terrorism financing. Not something the average person needs to be worried about however.

> Member States shall ensure that credit institutions refuse an application for a payment account with basic features where opening such an account would result in an infringement of the provisions on the prevention of money laundering and the countering of terrorist financing laid down in Directive 2005/60/EC.

https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32...

Another note that companies do not have a right for a bank account. Overcompliance and compliance theater is getting so bad, so that even normal small enterprises are starting to have issues. Banks just do not want to onboard small businesses because the life time value of a small business bank account is negative.

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