I went to a small, independent computer store today. I had previously reported the location twice for requiring ID on all credit and debit card purchases. This merchant even had the nerve to install an incriminating sign blatantly proclaiming their intent to violate.
Well, that sign has now been replaced by a sign indicating that only cash and checks are valid, and that no credit or debit cards will be accepted.
Oh well, it is their loss. The person I went with (I was just coming along, and would never patronize a repeat violator) was there to buy two laptops, two desktops, a monitor, and other miscellaneous supplies for her business. As they no longer accepted plastic, she left without making a purchase, and took her business to a competing location. That merchant lost thousands of dollars in business today, and all future business from that customer, all because they don't seem to see the value in accepting cards and following the rules to do so.
THEIR LOSS
The TACO BELL here increased their sales when they started taking credit cards
(they were only)
I hope they of their business for their
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I would have collected all the stuff and then presented the
(assuming you had time to waste)
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That's really bizzare that a computer store would switch to only taking cash and checks instead of just following the ID policy.
People tend to make really big purchases in computer stores, the kind you almost need to finance in some way. You're not likely to have enough for a whole brand new computer system in your checking account.
So even the people who would be perfectly willing to show ID or even go to the extent of writing "CID" on their cards will not be able to shop there due to not being rich enough to pay in cash.
The business will suffer and not just because of people deliberatly protesting their actions.
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That's why the whole things seems kind of fishy. It would almost be like a new car dealer suddenly foregoing financing and demanding cash only.
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For what it's worth, I can understand the merchant's problem. I used to be one. Owned a small computer store,
and accepted credit cards, and have a policy of checking ID's for purchases.. just signatures.
One week, for example, I was hit with about 23 thousand dollars in chargebacks. I was victimized by crooks that were
using stolen credit cards that must have been either cloned, or unsigned when stolen, and were signed
on the back by the criminals using them at my store. Since the sigs matched, the cards were accepted
by my employees (it involved 6 different cards in 6 different names, used by 6 different people. My security
cameras recorded the transactions, but the folks were never caught, and I was out 23k in revenue and
merchandise.
This was a number of years ago... I've long since gotten out of retail. But reading some of the comments
on this board where merchants have been referred to as stupid, criminal, idiotic, and sundry other
"lower-than-pond-scum" analogies, it tends to awaken a sinking feeling in my gut that I had way back
then.. it was not fun having no money for food, having my electric turned off at home, and telling my son
he was not getting anything for his birthday.. I was living hand-to-mouth at the time and trying to make
a go of it. I had the expenses of the store, and 3 employees to pay, so the person who ate the 46 thousand
dollars in losses was me.. and yes, it was at least 46 thousand dollars in losses.. since I lost the money,
the merchandise purchased with the cards (for which I paid wholesale, and wholesalers didn't offer small
vendors like me the same kind of discounts they offered the big retailers), and also the cost of replacing
the merchandise, so I lost the money plus 2x the wholesale price of all the merchandise. Wholesalers like
Tech Data and Ingram really didn't care that I was ripped off.
Just my perspective.. and it's also the reason I don't argue when a small business operator wants to
see my ID. I remember he or she may have a family to feed, and it's hard to feed them on guidelines
and rules. It takes money.
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For what it's worth, I can understand the merchant's problem. I used to be one. Owned a small computer store,
and accepted credit cards, and have a policy of checking ID's for purchases.. just signatures.
One week, for example, I was hit with about 23 thousand dollars in chargebacks. I was victimized by crooks that were
using stolen credit cards that must have been either cloned, or unsigned when stolen, and were signed
on the back by the criminals using them at my store. Since the sigs matched, the cards were accepted
by my employees (it involved 6 different cards in 6 different names, used by 6 different people. My security
cameras recorded the transactions, but the folks were never caught, and I was out 23k in revenue and
merchandise.
This was a number of years ago... I've long since gotten out of retail. But reading some of the comments
on this board where merchants have been referred to as stupid, criminal, idiotic, and sundry other
"lower-than-pond-scum" analogies, it tends to awaken a sinking feeling in my gut that I had way back
then.. it was not fun having no money for food, having my electric turned off at home, and telling my son
he was not getting anything for his birthday.. I was living hand-to-mouth at the time and trying to make
a go of it. I had the expenses of the store, and 3 employees to pay, so the person who ate the 46 thousand
dollars in losses was me.. and yes, it was at least 46 thousand dollars in losses.. since I lost the money,
the merchandise purchased with the cards (for which I paid wholesale, and wholesalers didn't offer small
vendors like me the same kind of discounts they offered the big retailers), and also the cost of replacing
the merchandise, so I lost the money plus 2x the wholesale price of all the merchandise. Wholesalers like
Tech Data and Ingram really didn't care that I was ripped off.
Just my perspective.. and it's also the reason I don't argue when a small business operator wants to
see my ID. I remember he or she may have a family to feed, and it's hard to feed them on guidelines
and rules. It takes money.
Excellent points. VISA & MC don't do anything to dissuade people from thinking that THEY cover losses, when in fact they don't. Maybe that's the secret to having the policy, other than a handful of annoying repeat complainers to deal with, it doesn't cost them anything.
The name calling and assumptions of criminal activity, while not 100% incorrect, is still juvenile and out-of-line. Merchants do have legitimate concerns, too.
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have an easy time hiding profits (not that they will ever think of doing that)
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How does a not have any bounced checks???
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Not necessary a universally true statement, In my experience, I had more
incidents of bounced checks versus chargebacks purely on a per-incident basis
but higher losses in chargebacks. The laws at the time stated a bounced
check for more than $500 could be charged as a felony, so most of the
people writing me bad checks kept it under $500. Also, the local laws allowed
for treble recovery (3x the value of the check, up to $1500). I gave people
an honest chance to redeem their check, and I only charged them my *real*
fees (my bank only charged me $4 for a returned deposited item at the time,
so I only charged them $5.. $4 for the fee, and $1 for me to notify them).
If they made good on it, no harm, no foul. If I had to turn it over to the
local PD for enforcement, I went for treble. In general, when averaged out,
I lost virtually nothing on bad checks, as getting arrested tends to make
the check writer find a way to pay the damages to me to avoid conviction.
The local court would usually expunge the record if they paid me before
trial date, and stayed clean for 6 months to a year afterward. I never used
collection agencies for bad checks.. it was a waste of time.
Chargebacks occurred less frequently, but almost always for higher-dollar
amounts, and the money and merchandise lost were rarely recovered. Most
of the time I didn't have the address of the purchaser, and getting that information
cost me time and money, and in most instances the person "owning" the card
simply told me their card was stolen or otherwise fraudulently used. My recovery
rate on chargeback expenses was under 20 percent. In the cases where
fraud wasn't involved or claimed, the purchaser claimed the merchandise was
broken or non-functional and that's why they did a chargeback. I remember
one chargeback for $1500 in business software in the old "mucho-floppy-disk"
media days.. they claimed the software disks were defective. When I finally
got them back, it was obvious all the boxes had somehow been under
water.. floppies don't like water. They claimed I sold the stuff to them
that way.. never mind the fact that the boxes stuck out like a sore thumb, and
I never would have put the stuff on the shelf like that (swollen cardboard, dissolved
glue/tape, etc).
To me, Chargebacks were *way* more of a problem than bounced checks.
Therefore, I would not agree that an approved card rarely "bounces".
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You have a better chance of getting reimbursed for a bounced check than you would through a successful chargeback.
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For what it's worth, I can understand the merchant's problem. I used to be one. Owned a small computer store,
and accepted credit cards, and have a policy of checking ID's for purchases.. just signatures.
One week, for example, I was hit with about 23 thousand dollars in chargebacks. I was victimized by crooks that were
using stolen credit cards that must have been either cloned, or unsigned when stolen, and were signed
on the back by the criminals using them at my store. Since the sigs matched, the cards were accepted
by my employees (it involved 6 different cards in 6 different names, used by 6 different people. My security
cameras recorded the transactions, but the folks were never caught, and I was out 23k in revenue and
merchandise.
This was a number of years ago... I've long since gotten out of retail. But reading some of the comments
on this board where merchants have been referred to as stupid, criminal, idiotic, and sundry other
"lower-than-pond-scum" analogies, it tends to awaken a sinking feeling in my gut that I had way back
then.. it was not fun having no money for food, having my electric turned off at home, and telling my son
he was not getting anything for his birthday.. I was living hand-to-mouth at the time and trying to make
a go of it. I had the expenses of the store, and 3 employees to pay, so the person who ate the 46 thousand
dollars in losses was me.. and yes, it was at least 46 thousand dollars in losses.. since I lost the money,
the merchandise purchased with the cards (for which I paid wholesale, and wholesalers didn't offer small
vendors like me the same kind of discounts they offered the big retailers), and also the cost of replacing
the merchandise, so I lost the money plus 2x the wholesale price of all the merchandise. Wholesalers like
Tech Data and Ingram really didn't care that I was ripped off.
Just my perspective.. and it's also the reason I don't argue when a small business operator wants to
see my ID. I remember he or she may have a family to feed, and it's hard to feed them on guidelines
and rules. It takes money.
So your point is chargebacks suck, right?
Where do you get the idea that checking ID would have made you any less likely to get a chargeback? (hint: it doesn't)
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I presume you would agree that fraudulent chargebacks, and the merchant taking the loss for something that isn't their fault, isn't cool, so... what would you suggest to protect the merchant? Please, be specific.
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Stop making sense. It's verboten.
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At the risk of sounding snarky, let me point this out.
When it doesn't rain for a really long time, that isn't cool. What do I suggest to make it rain when we want it to? I have no idea what to suggest. But I do know that going outside with a megaphone and yelling "Hey you blankety blank clouds, give me some rain here!" will NOT work.
You don't have to be able to suggest a reasonable alternative to be able to know that something doesn't work.
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At the risk of sounding snarky, let me point this out.
When it doesn't rain for a really long time, that isn't cool. What do I suggest to make it rain when we want it to? I have no idea what to suggest. But I do know that going outside with a megaphone and yelling "Hey you blankety blank clouds, give me some rain here!" will NOT work.
You don't have to be able to suggest a reasonable alternative to be able to know that something doesn't work.
But, the status quo doesn't really work for everybody involved either, and that seems to be where the disconnect lies. Even if a specific plan isn't in mind, rather than throwing up hands and saying "I don't know" or "It's not my problem", a dialogue about the issue would be a good place to start.
I wonder how many people would say "If you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen" regarding being in business, then turn around and bemoan the fact when places like Wal-Mart are our only shopping choices because too many places that are willing to offer decent options and customer service run on a thinner line close shop because they cannot afford excessive losses due in part to fraud? Fraud that probably could be greatly avoided if we allowed ourselves to rethink things.
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Yes, this makes sense. We really need to focus on finding a good alternative that suits all honest parties as best as possible.
What I focus on here is that the credit card companies have a certain contract that businesses are expected to follow. Credit card companies have more money than god and can hire all kinds of professionals to asess the risks of certain actions-and they have decided that checking ID does NOT decrease the rate of credit card fraud, at least not in a statistically significant way.
Credit card companies want to keep their problems to a minimum and I am sure this no-ID policy is the policy with the least risk to them. [ETA: The risk to them in terms of directly losing money, and in terms of losing customers who have lost money, or getting sued by the customers, things such as that.] We can speculate back and forth about how much fraud ID checking prevents versus how much it causes or even if it makes a difference at all-but the credit card companies have the studies and the stats and the professionals and they have this policy for a reason.
What is the better alternative? Honestly, the only thing I can think of is some bio thing like a fingerprint scanner. But who wants to do a thing like that? I am sure part of the answer lies also in better crime detection and prosecution.
But the credit card companies have figured out that ID checking isn't the answer and I'm sure they are working on a better one, but the fact also remains for now that when a contract is signed, both parties must abide by it. So any real challenge to whether or not ID should be checked should be given to MC/Visa/etc., not taken up with individual merchants and insisting they should take it upon themselves to check ID and put themselves at risk by violating the policy.
The bottom line is really that if someone wants to have their ID checked upon using a credit card, that person needs to pressure the credit card companies to change the policy, because that's where it all lies.
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Is it possible that CC companies saying ID checking does not decrease fraud akin to cigarette companies claiming tobacco is harmless? Considering that their primary concern is making money, how much stock should we put in what they say?
I'm speculating of course, and tend to be cynical anyway, but I'd suspect the 'reason' is path of least resistance and passing the buck. They're not actually backing up this anti-fraud policy, they're passing the cost onto somebody else. I'd be more open to their statements if they actually put their money where their mouths are and backed it up themselves.
I've always thought something like using a PIN similar to a debit card (but not making it literally a debit card) would be a good move. I don't know enough about "PIN & Chip" to comment about the chip part, and I have heard that it has it's down points as well, but there's has to be a better solution that is more fair for everybody. I've never been one to reject anything simply because it's not an ideal or perfect change. A good solid step in a positive direction can be enough.
Personally, I would not favor fingerprint scans. If that were the only option, I'd rather leave thing as they are.
I also agree that, as long as the system is as it is now, merchants should abide by the agreements they sign.
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Sounds like the only way to effect any kind of positive change for merchants would be for merchants to band together. Maybe by refusing to take CCs for a time and cut into the CCs profits. Problem is, the bigger retailers would never be part of this as they absorb the losses relatively easy.
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I don't get it..............
What is this deal with a business that gets of chargebacks???
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Stop making sense. It's verboten.
If they have the physical card, they most likely have an ID that was in the same package as the card.
If they made the card they can probably make an ID even more easily.
ETA: If someone saw a DL in order to accept one of my cards, that increased the chance of a chargeback from almost nil to 100%.
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You say these things as if they're the only possibilities. Far from it. It's easy to pick and choose which scenarios ID checking wouldn't help and ignore the others as if they don't exist. How about the scenarios where it would help?