The Lemon Fool

Stompa wrote:compared to larger stores (which IME [almost?] always accept small card transactions).

Although you occasionally see small shops with a "no cards below £x" sign, in my experience the national retailers have always been happy to take a card payment no matter how small; smallest so far, 5p when I decided that actually I did want a bag.

As for the use of contactless, every Monday lunchtime I wait in an enormous queue in Boots in central London to take advantage of their £1 O2 meal deal. £1 would be an easy sum of money for someone to pay in cash, but over the last year I have yet to see anyone pay other than by card, almost invariably a contactless card.

I think the mistake most people on this thread are making is to think contactless is intended as a replacement for chip and pin. It isn't. It is intended as a replacement for cash. And in that it wins hands down:
Harder to steal. Harder to lose. Quicker and cheaper for businesses to handle.

Minimum transactions are down to the way retailers are charged for cards. Fixed fee for debit cards, Percentage with a minimum fee for CC. So if the banks want retailers to accept contactless (as they surely do because it is much easier for the banks to handle than cash), then all they have to do is set the transaction costs appropriately.

gryff

gryffron wrote:I think the mistake most people on this thread are making is to think contactless is intended as a replacement for chip and pin. It isn't. It is intended as a replacement for cash. And in that it wins hands down:
Harder to steal. Harder to lose. Quicker and cheaper for businesses to handle.
gryff

How I wish we had recs...

AF62 wrote: in my experience the national retailers have always been happy to take a card payment no matter how small; smallest so far, 5p when I decided that actually I did want a bag.

I've made a few small, sub £1 contactless payments, it still feels a bit odd. But isn't your statement above a misremembering? Is it right, you went into a national retailer and only needed a 5p bag?

gryffron wrote:Minimum transactions are down to the way retailers are charged for cards. Fixed fee for debit cards, Percentage with a minimum fee for CC. So if the banks want retailers to accept contactless (as they surely do because it is much easier for the banks to handle than cash), then all they have to do is set the transaction costs appropriately.

As a matter of interest, debit cards are now pretty much all on a %, certainly domestic mastercard and via are. They changed earlier this year. We pay 0.435% so the charger quickly gets higher (at roughly £70) but it makes it viable to take debit cards on even very small transactions.

RedSnapper wrote:

gryffron wrote:Minimum transactions are down to the way retailers are charged for cards. Fixed fee for debit cards, Percentage with a minimum fee for CC. So if the banks want retailers to accept contactless (as they surely do because it is much easier for the banks to handle than cash), then all they have to do is set the transaction costs appropriately.

As a matter of interest, debit cards are now pretty much all on a %, certainly domestic mastercard and via are. They changed earlier this year. We pay 0.435% so the charger quickly gets higher (at roughly £70) but it makes it viable to take debit cards on even very small transactions.

The farm shop wouldn't take a debit card for £8.75 on Saturday, they said their till doesn't even work with cards for that amount. I had no cash. Luckily they let me add the total to the Christmas order cost so it will be paid when that is collected in a couple of weeks.

Mel

RedSnapper wrote:As a matter of interest, debit cards are now pretty much all on a %, certainly domestic mastercard and via are. They changed earlier this year.

Thanks, I didn't know that. Obviously all part of the banks' grand plan to eliminate cash

gryff

Banks make money from cash by charging retail businesses rip off rates for counting in (till take) and out (wages/change). Commonly referred to as bank charges. (They tried it with ATM charges for individuals but the public outcry made them backtrack).
I used to take advantage of the Post Offices (RIP) thirst for cash (thanks OAP's) and their kind free offers back in the day.

I've never done the maths to work out if the % commission charged to the retail merchant accounts outweighs banking cash fees but I know which is easier to deal with over all and it ain't cash...

According to a manager in Aldi I spoke to the other week the maximum transaction limit for CL is going up soon, so the fraud aspect can't be too much of an issue. From the research I've done CL is a tiny % of the overall fraud pie. Bearing in mind that all the financial institutions are very reticent to discuss fraud at all, so there's no guarantee the figures they do release are actually reflective of the true situation.

Caveat emptor and all that.

kempiejon wrote:I've made a few small, sub £1 contactless payments, it still feels a bit odd. But isn't your statement above a misremembering? Is it right, you went into a national retailer and only needed a 5p bag?

Why do you think it feels odd? I've made numerous C&P sub £1 payments (the lowest being 14p), and it doesn't feel remotely strange to me!

k333 wrote:

midnightcatprowl wrote:
Also it is beyond me why people can't find some PIN that they can remember. It must be that they aren't aware that it can be changed. Or don't trust themselves to change it and not mess it up.

- K

Some people have so many cards, remembereing all the different numbers must be impossible

john

johnstevens77 wrote:

k333 wrote:

midnightcatprowl wrote:
Also it is beyond me why people can't find some PIN that they can remember. It must be that they aren't aware that it can be changed. Or don't trust themselves to change it and not mess it up.

- K

Some people have so many cards, remembereing all the different numbers must be impossible

john

Not just cards. My block of flats has separate pin codes for door entry(2), bins stores (2), utility cupboards (3) and they get changed annually to stop unauthorised access. Then they forget to post the new codes to half the block...

I have to say I find it baffling that so many people apparently don't care if they are defrauded of 'minor' amounts such as £15 at a time. Especially young people, allegedly - who are these reckless youths, who have so much money they aren't bothered what happens to it? Yet the whole USP of contactless seems to be that 'only' £15 a time, or maximum £90 per day, can be stolen, as if that doesn't matter.

It's also a bit of a generalization that teenagers/students in general are blase about the risks of contactless cards. As my daughter (aged 14) pointed out when offered one, it would be blatantly asking for trouble if, say, she took hers to school intending to use it on the way home - the rule in most schools is, if it isn't nailed down...and once taken, it could be several fraudulent transactions later before she discovered and reported the loss - by which time, her limited funds would have been totally cleaned out, with no watertight guarantee of being recovered.

LadyGagarin wrote:I have to say I find it baffling that so many people apparently don't care if they are defrauded of 'minor' amounts such as £15 at a time. Especially young people, allegedly - who are these reckless youths, who have so much money they aren't bothered what happens to it? Yet the whole USP of contactless seems to be that 'only' £15 a time, or maximum £90 per day, can be stolen, as if that doesn't matter.

Where's your evidence that anybody doesn't care about being defrauded?

While we're at it, where's your evidence that anybody has ever been defrauded in a contactless transaction?

Scott.

johnstevens77 wrote:Some people have so many cards, remembereing all the different numbers must be impossible

You could always make them all the same number.

Or if you feel that's insecure, some variation of the same root (e.g. make the third digit the last digit of the card number, or something like that).

Scott.

swill453 wrote:
While we're at it, where's your evidence that anybody has ever been defrauded in a contactless transaction?

Scott.

I have no particular belief that retailers are defrauding people. But they are a cost to the providers. My wallet went at the weekend, reported within a couple of hours. 7 transactions for about GBP120 across 3 cards before the system could shut them down. Somebody, somewhere is paying for these events; but I'd imagine it is pence per year per card holder......

swill453 wrote:Or if you feel that's insecure, some variation of the same root (e.g. make the third digit the last digit of the card number, or something like that).

I'd avoid relying on the card number, as that will often change when the card expires and is replaced.

Stompa

LadyGagarin wrote:I have to say I find it baffling that so many people apparently don't care if they are defrauded of 'minor' amounts such as £15 at a time. Especially young people, allegedly - who are these reckless youths, who have so much money they aren't bothered what happens to it? Yet the whole USP of contactless seems to be that 'only' £15 a time, or maximum £90 per day, can be stolen, as if that doesn't matter.

It's also a bit of a generalization that teenagers/students in general are blase about the risks of contactless cards. As my daughter (aged 14) pointed out when offered one, it would be blatantly asking for trouble if, say, she took hers to school intending to use it on the way home - the rule in most schools is, if it isn't nailed down...and once taken, it could be several fraudulent transactions later before she discovered and reported the loss - by which time, her limited funds would have been totally cleaned out, with no watertight guarantee of being recovered.

Eh? Who doesn't care? Who is being defrauded? I don't understand your comment.

I use contactless cards all the time and have not been defrauded.

It's £30 limit now anyway, and very handy it is too.

No-one I know says it doesn't matter and banks refund fraudulent losses.

Mel

LadyGagarin wrote:I have to say I find it baffling that so many people apparently don't care if they are defrauded of 'minor' amounts such as £15 at a time. Especially young people, allegedly - who are these reckless youths, who have so much money they aren't bothered what happens to it? Yet the whole USP of contactless seems to be that 'only' £15 a time, or maximum £90 per day, can be stolen, as if that doesn't matter.

[DevilsAdvocate]
How much cash have you got in your purse? That can be stolen easily. Or pilfered by shop staff. And you have no hope of catching the culprit, or tracing or reversing the transactions. All of which are relatively easy with a contactless card. Do you not care about getting your money back, or catching criminals?
[EndDevilsAdvocate]

This new technology still may not be perfect, but is much MUCH better than yesterday's alternative. Contactless IS progress.

Gryff

I am getting the impression from a number of posts that the contactless card receipt is not important. This ties in with my recent experience at my local Supermarket. A young lady in front of me paid with a chip and pin card but waved the proffered receipt away!
Coming back to cash. When you run out of cash you know you have run out. All these small contactless transactions can add up.
How do you keep control of your spending?

kempiejon wrote:

AF62 wrote: in my experience the national retailers have always been happy to take a card payment no matter how small; smallest so far, 5p when I decided that actually I did want a bag.

I've made a few small, sub £1 contactless payments, it still feels a bit odd. But isn't your statement above a misremembering? Is it right, you went into a national retailer and only needed a 5p bag?

I had bought £10 from them and paid by card. Then decided it would be helpful to have a carrier bag, so had to pay 5p for one. I don't carry coins and wasn't going to end up with a pocket full of change by paying with a bank note.