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EU: “You cannot be charged a fee for paying by card, but you can be charged a fee for paying in cash.” No worries about marginlising Americans who face discrimination by banks. (www.fiserv.com)
submitted 10 months ago by to c/humanrights@crazypeople.online
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cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/30909420

According to the linked leaflet, the EU’s payment services directive ensures that “You can no longer be charged extra costs by a merchant when you pay using a card issued in the EU.” But they neglect to extend reciprocity to cash payers.

Incidentally, this exacerbates adversely discriminatory treatment of Americans who face uniquely poor treatment by banks. Cash is the sole notable refuge from shitty banks.

Upcharging cash payers violates human rights. This is not only attributed to banks discriminating on the basis of nationality. We have a human right to:

  • self-determinism
  • autonomy
  • consumer protection
  • privacy

Penalising cash payers is an assault on any consumer who exercises their self-deterministic right to live autonomous and independent from banks.

No consumer protection is more important than the right to opt out of a transaction. It’s the only consumer protection that one can give themself without relying on others. Surcharging consumers who opt out of banking is an attack on that option. It puts a price on consumer protection.

Banking inherently entails abuse of privacy. The digital footprint is huge and undermins data minimisation rights.

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[–] 0 points 10 months ago* (2 children)

In my region, you can haggle a discount when paying cash. It's called Skonto and can be like 2-4%, but usually ppl don't even bother unless the total is like >300€ or so.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 10 months ago* (1 child)

    It’s laissez-faire everywhere in this regard AFAIK. At a street market you can of course haggle because there is no policy or contract. Outside of that narrow context, cash payers are upcharged because they lack the protection being given to card payers. The most important transactions are for things like public transport, mass transit and utilities. There is no haggle.

    Utilities suppliers are increasingly quitting cash acceptance entirely. So then cash payers are forced to pay their bills using the post office, who charges a fee. Mass transit services are providing online and kiosk transactions for card payers without fees, then forcing cash payers to get manual service from a human. Then they charge a fee rationalising that they need to pay the worker a wage.

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    • [–] 0 points 7 months ago (5 children)

    But they neglect to extend reciprocity to cash payers.

    This is a false conclusion. The linked paper just says,

    merchants cannot make you pay more than the published price (‘surcharge’) when you pay with consumer debit and credit cards.

    Apparently, some merchants have done this in the past, and this is now prohibited. But they can never charge you more than the published price if you pay cash.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 7 months ago* (4 children)

    This is a false conclusion.

    On what basis are you concluding the contrary? Neglect to extend reciprocity to cash payers is trivially verifiable. Find in the paper where the contrary is true (that there is a prohibition on cash surcharges). Can’t find it? Yes, indeed it’s not there. Because there is no statutory reciprocity in the statute the article refers to. It is therefore a true conclusion.

    Apparently, some merchants have done this in the past, and this is now prohibited. But they can never charge you more than the published price if you pay cash.

    You’re confusing cash with electronic payment. There is a new prohibition on surcharges for electronic payment. The same is not true of cash payment. Or do you have a source to cite proving the contrary?

    To be clear, proving the absence of law is non-trivial. But if there is a protection for cash payers, I would be very interested in seeing the citation because I will use it in legal actions. I will wait while you dig that up.

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  • [–] 1 point 7 months ago (3 children)

    If a certain price is published -say, a price tag in a brick-and-mortar store or in a catalogue says item A costs 10 bucks - then they can't charge you more than that price.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 7 months ago* (2 children)

    You’re talking about a different law for a different purpose. There is indeed truth in advertising laws and consumer protections that prohibit deceptive practices in the marketplace. Those laws predate the law I linked, which specifically bans the practice of surchaging electronic payers even when properly disclosed. At the same time, no law prohibits surcharging cash payers given proper disclosures that circumvent misleading prices. And so the reality that we see playing out is that cash payers are forced to pay surcharges and/or penalties. This is the case with rail, buses, utilities, etc.

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