Posted by madars 9 hours ago
I've always found credit cards stupid. You just want to pay for something, and then suddenly you have a debt. You shouldn't be in debt when you can clearly pay with money you have. Credit card companies advertise with "super easy payments" and "buy now pay later" but at the same time the government warns all the time that "lending money costs money". Also, if your credit card number and CVC get leaked, then anybody can steal any amount of money, and your only recourse is to regularly check your statements and warn the bank within a month. Whereas with Wero/iDEAL you must authorize the exact transaction at that exact amount.
Supposedly, Americans have these "credit card rewards" loyalty program things. Doesn't exist in Europe. You can only pay, you don't get any bonuses. Which makes the only reason to have a credit card is to be able to pay in web shops that don't accept Wero/iDEAL.
In addition I can deposit money on my credit card, so effectively I never have to be in debt if I don't want to. I just have to charge it up which is done in like 3 seconds in the banking app. It can even be automated.
Lastly credit cards with bonus programs definitely exist in Europe. Cashback variations are the most common ones, but all kinds of programs exist. E.g. Eurowings has one https://www.eurowings.com/de/ihre-vorteile/kreditkarten/uebe...
(I don’t think the fraud distinction you’re making is as stark in practice: in the US, you’re less exposed to fraud with credit since it’s the creditor’s money, not yours. Reversing a debit transaction in the US is somewhat more involved, albeit for not-good reasons concerning the US’s aging financial infrastructure.)
Wero, SEPA, and the digital euro are complementing each others
The liability model is completely different in the US from Europe w.r.t. merchant vs bank.
The interchange fees are much much higher in the US, which is what pays for the rewards. Europe has an artificial cap.
The only reasons to use a CC in EU are:
- online payments where CC is the only accepted form of payment
- delay payments until after receiving wage
- hotels, car rentals, and other places that lock an amount on your card
- extra insurance provided by some more premium cards (VISA Gold etc)
Ever since 3-D Secure (2FA for CC transactions, beyond the CCV code), you have been liable for any transaction that was validated by it. Your bank may still do a chargeback as a courtesy, but that's not guaranteed.
It's not fully unnecessary step in-between when fraud is involved.
If someone hacks you/deceives you and somehow they got $5000 from your debit card, then your bank account is $5000 smaller. That can impact your ability to pay rent, or whatever you needed those $5000 for.
If it's via credit card, you have a decent amount of time to contest and resolve the issue.
the disputed amount should effectively be removed from your balance or offset by a temporary provisional credit until the investigation is completed
That's a myth. I had my debit card cloned and some money stolen. The bank gave my money back. Debit cards are protected too.
Between the time [some money stolen] and [bank gave my money back] your checking account balance was lowered by the amount stolen.
With a credit card, your checking account isn't directly affected.
Both are protected, the difference is your effective checking account balance in the time window between the time the money is stolen and the money is recovered.
You're just raising the price for everyone for the sake of Visa & Mastercard's profit. Europe's cap makes a ton of sense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_household...
But I guess it’s the same logic as the tipping point/ salary culture in the US.
Or the fact that sales tax is not always included in the price.
EU has low fees for transfer, USA has high fees for transfer but apparently its easier for an US Citizen to dispute something.
At least as far as i'm aware, if i send money to someone else, its gone.
Whats that artifical cap?
I've never understood this mentality. It's like walking through a dangerous neighborhood knowing that you have excellent health insurance. If you get stabbed, you'll probably recover very well, but why take the risk?
I can understand going into debt to buy a house, but I can't understand going into debt to buy a can of tuna. Why take an unnecessary risk?
Besides this GDPR Website thing, usb-c is great, energy standards are great, etc.
IMO the biggest issue is that the member states are individually required to set up agencies to police this. This makes perfect sense for local companies, but is meaningless against large entities that operate across the entire EU.
You can report issues to your local watchdog. That takes quite some time, given the large amount of companies that do not follow the law, but it is enforced
Nonetheless, i have seen in a very small company that we changed the behaviour of a camera which then only turned on when the action expected it and not before.
And in a very big company you alway have to fullfill it as a product standard.
What about RSD to Serbia? CHF to Switzerland?
Or, if the UK/USA/China set up their own pseudo-cryptocurrency, you can probably exchange digital euros for digital dollars or digital yuans.
My VISA card is not only a convenient payment method, it also forces ATM operators to give me cash without any extra fees. In Germany the EC card used to be THE way of paying with a card but you had to go to the ATMs of your bank, otherwise there would be sometimes pretty ridiculous fees. The kicker was that the fees were set by your home bank.
Add to that the ease of use online as well as in shops and it's easy to see that this is not going to be easy. I do root for them though, to do better than Wero.
And that has absolutely nothing to do with Visa, but everything to do with your local banks.
I still see atm fees over here in the us, so it can't just be being visa. I would guess some regulation but you could get that applied to the digital euro too probably?
I do use my credit card everywere and i'm sure ingdiba is also saving money due to not having offices/ATMs everywhere, but i wouldn't mind if something in the background changes and we can replace Visa/Mastercard with something from the EU.
My Danish bank imposed a fee on using an ATM from another bank, until my income was high enough to make me a "premium" customer, then these fees were removed. The card didn't change.
There already exists multiple EU-wide payment systems handled by commercial banks. They just need to step up their game a little bit to get rid of Visa and Mastercard, which provide all the debit and credit cards.