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Comment by troupo | Hacker News Reader

American Express is often not accepted even in countries where it's supposed to be present (e.g. quite a few shops in Sweden don't accept AmEx).

Visa and MasterCard are much more universally accepted.

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Real talk, shops will not continue to reject AmEx when they realize Amex is bringing the size and scope of the APPLE consumer market

That consumer market is already available to them via Apple Pay, and people paying with their Visas and MasterCards.

Apple Card is non-existent outside the US.

How many Amex holders don't have a second card? I've never heard of anybody getting to the checkout line, then saying oh drat, they only take visa, and walking out.

OTOH I typically only have 2-3 non-Amex charges a month. Costco is the main one (used to be Amex only too).

I'm sure lots of people use their Amex preferentially, but I've never seen anyone put their hand on a door handle, then see that only visa/mc stickers are in the window, and walk away.

I have. When someone wanted to expense something. Or when they didn’t want to bother with the Chase card declining because it forgot they were still overseas or whatnot.

For 16 or so years Costco required you to have an AmexEx card if you weren't paying with cash or debit, now they only take Visa. This was apparently something lots of newish members weren't aware of so it wasn't too uncommon to be in line and have someone say they didn't have the right card to pay. You'd then have to wait for the checkout person to give them the Costco Amex card spiel.

Maybe. I think Amex is still the leading corporate card — hard to find a less price sensitive bunch than people spending someone else’s money. That was part of why Amex was accepted in many places: high potential for big orders.

If my Apple Card switched to Amex I might switch the default tap to pay card to something else. Right now it’s very convenient for everywhere that takes tap-to-pay, but… who wants to deal with it sometimes not working?

It’s basically zero effort to use a different card.

I think GP's point was that with AMEX not being accepted everywhere, it would no longer be a transparent action to pay with tap. Now they would have to either deal with the rejection and change to a non-default card, or they would need to prepare in advance by looking around for what kinds of cards are accepted. Neither of these things are a big deal, but it's friction, and consumers don't like friction.

Yeah I mean if it happens once or twice I’m gonna switch to a different default card. The .5% extra cash back isn’t that much, especially for something that’s all about convenience.

Mostly the Apple Card was a novelty for me: 100% of my usages is via Apple Pay.

Apple devices aren't nearly as universal outside of the US (except Japan where they're even more universal) and there are already payment options for non-US Apple users. I think I have four different payment cards in my Wallet.

If you want the Apple consumer market, you support Apple Pay and then the cards you support don't matter.

Make me paw my credit card out of my wallet like an animal, be it an AMEX or Apple Car, and I find somewhere else to shop.

In my country they will, just because of the far higher merchant fees Amex charges compared to Visa and Mastercard.

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