Non-motoring > Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK Green Issues
Thread Author: No FM2R Replies: 20

 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - No FM2R
www.bbc.com/news/business-59306200

I suspect that this is a "who blinks first" situation, but we shall see....
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Manatee

>> I suspect that this is a "who blinks first" situation, but we shall see....

Definitely - I'm sure Amazon doesn't want to lose Visa credit card sales. And Visa won't want to lose Amazon, which a large proportion of its credit card customers will be users of.

Visa seems to be losing out just now - one of my credit card issuers and Firstdirect with its debit card have recently switched to Mastercard.

 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Bromptonaut
>> Visa seems to be losing out just now - one of my credit card issuers
>> and Firstdirect with its debit card have recently switched to Mastercard.

Santander also seem to be migrating away from Visa.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Zero
Ditto Nat West.

I have the Amazon credit card, Gets me cashback vouchers, I set up a DD to pay in full each month, cut it up and chucked it in the bin. Its not got a huge limit, costs me nowt, and gives me money back on stuff i buy in Amazon.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - stan10
" .. "who blinks first" .."

I have Visa - surely Amazon has the most to lose , ?

Don't care who owns what, (probably both US owned ?)
My card is Visa, if Amazon won't take it i'll shop elsewhere

NOT a difficult decision .. 'bye !
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - No FM2R
>> " .. "who blinks first" .."
>>
>> I have Visa - surely Amazon has the most to lose , ?

Well, that's kind of the point about waiting to see who blinks first. Both have a considerable amount to lose. However, it's easier to replace a Visa card with a Mastercard than it is to replace AMazon with.... urrrr.

>> My card is Visa, if Amazon won't take it i'll shop elsewhere

Probably a marginal customer then.

As it happens for me I have both Visa & Mastercard, so it doesn't really matter much to me, I'll just use the other one. Which I suspect is what many would do.

And of course, if Amazon get away with it then that strengthens the hand even further of other retailers who want to knock Visa's rates down, but of course conversely strengthens Mastercard's since Amazon couldn't lose them both.

I am reasonably sure that some face-saving deal, for both sides, will be done.

>> NOT a difficult decision .. 'bye !

Then you are probably not one that either Visa or Amazon are worried about, since their war doesn't affect you, then you spending probably doesn't affect them.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - PeterS
Well I assume Amazon have calculated that Visa will capitulate on the fees issue, as leaving themselves taking just Mastercard (yes, I know there’s AMEX too, but their U.K. market share is tiny) just leaves them exposed to rate rises from Mastercard in the future surely? Though, having checked my wallet Santander and HSBC are Mastercard for credit and debit, JL is Mastercard and Amex is Amex. So I wonder how big Visa’s market share is in the U.K. now
. I remember years ago having an HSBC credit card account that had a Visa and a Mastercard card (on the same account). But I can’t recall a single time when a vendor didn’t take either. I used them to separate personal from business expenses though.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - No FM2R
Mastercard and Visa are payment networks, they don't actually issue cards, the cards are issued by a bank.

Consequently what Amazon is saying here is that it will not accept credit cards which use the Visa Credit Card payment network. There is currently no implication for debit cards.

As a payment network they provide a service to both bank and retailer and charged both.

For a bank to switch payment network is less of a deal than you might think. One of mine changed recently and the first I new of it was when my card was reissued with an MC logo not a Visa logo.

So this argument is not quite as straightforward as you might think. As I recall, and it was a while ago, most credit card payments are processed using the MC network whereas most debit card payments are processed using the Visa network.

However, the networks have near identical coverage, all Ts&Cs, rates and benefits come from the card issuer, not the network provider.

Visa will be being pressured by the banks for whom they provide a payment network service, as well as by the retailers.

Credit cards could be reissued on a different network, debit cards are not involved, and it any case it is only UK issued cards to Amazon UK.

People who think they are being loyal to Visa or Mastercard for some reason or other, or some benefit or other, are usually, not not absolutely always, wrong.

There are some benefits offered by the network as part of their service offering, but not all cards necessarily carry that benefit since ultimately it depends on the issuing bank. And vice versa of course.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Wed 17 Nov 21 at 23:28
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - zippy
>>not not absolutely always, wrong

Are there supposed to be two nots? The meaning changes if there is or isn't.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - No FM2R
Hopefully this is now much clearer for you and closer to what I meant...

"People who think they are being loyal to Visa or Mastercard for some reason or other, or some benefit or other, are usually, not not not absolutely always, wrong."

p.s.

Are there supposed to be two nots?
^^^ plural

The meaning changes if there is or isn't.
.................................................^^ singular
Last edited by: No FM2R on Thu 18 Nov 21 at 00:14
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Manatee
>> " .. "who blinks first" .."
>>
>> I have Visa - surely Amazon has the most to lose , ?


Visa will see it that way too. Universal acceptance is critical to Visa maintaining share of transactions, without it they might as well pack up and go home.

My money would be on Amazon getting some sort of deal, not necessarily on the headline price. There's a lot goes on in terms of rules around recharges, fraud etc. although I imagine Amazon has the best terms already.

Visa is owned by mainly US banks. Mastercard is a bit more of an agglomeration I think but has been a public company for a long time IIRC.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Duncan
"Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK", is the topic heading, which leaves the question what happens in the rest of the world. Presumably Visa rates of commission and T&Cs are acceptable elsewhere?
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Manatee
Most of the merchant fee goes to the issuers, a sliver goes to the network (Visa/Mastercard etc) processing the payments. All those slivers as up to quite a lot. I think Visa has put up this 'interchange' rate in the UK post-Brexit presumably justified by the additional bureaucracy that Brexit has caused.

Amazon presumably thinks Visa can absorb it as far as Amazon's business is concerned. I wouldn't be surprised if someone's bluff is called and there were to be a hiatus in Visa acceptance by Amazon, followed in due course by a reconciliation.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Bromptonaut
>> Most of the merchant fee goes to the issuers, a sliver goes to the network
>> (Visa/Mastercard etc) processing the payments. All those slivers as up to quite a lot. I
>> think Visa has put up this 'interchange' rate in the UK post-Brexit presumably justified by
>> the additional bureaucracy that Brexit has caused.

The interchange rate was being mentioned on radio bulletins last night.

Amazon's European operations are an EU entity. EU Regulations effectively place a cap on interchange rates. Post Brexit of course that no longer applies vis a vis the UK. As a consequence rates have gone up from well under 1% to something like 1.5%. Cannot remember the exact numbers but they were in that territory where perception says small numbers but in reality 1.5% is three times as much as 0.5%.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Manatee
Interchange is more like 0.08% or was, I'm a bit out of touch now. The rest goes to the card issuers.

As you say there was long kerfuffle (years and years) between the networks, banks, and EU competition authorities about merchant fees which eventually resulted in them being reduced.

The problem was that, although consumers pay for it, they aren't aware of that so if anything they were more likely to choose credit cards with extra benefits - which are of course paid for out of the merchant fees. So you had a bizarre situation in which market forces actually pushed up the cost of credit card acceptance to consumers. It really did need regulating.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Maisie's Dad
Changes have already taken effect here in Australia...

"Due to the costs associated with Visa transactions, beginning 1 November 2021, Amazon will apply a 0.5% surcharge to purchases made using Visa credit cards on Amazon.com.au."
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - No FM2R
I understand that Amazon UK is also in negotiations with Mastercard about their fees.

 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - Bromptonaut
>> Changes have already taken effect here in Australia...
>>
>> "Due to the costs associated with Visa transactions, beginning 1 November 2021, Amazon will apply
>> a 0.5% surcharge to purchases made using Visa credit cards on Amazon.com.au."

I'm sure they'd love to do that here but the law changed around five years ago preventing retailers from charging extra for card transactions.

IIRC it was a EU regulation so we could, as a sovereign maritime nation, repeal.
 Amazon to stop accepting Visa credit cards in UK - stan10
Sorry No FM2R
Drifting in and out of here so i'm late as usual, .. but i should reply ..

Yes i am now rarely an Amazon user.
In the past i used them "reasonably" often, then they introduced Amazon Prime.
A friend who always jumps in to anything new signed up.
I asked him "what's the advantage given the extra cost?"

"guaranteed next day delivery"
"but everything i have ordered comes next day anyway, so what else ?"
"erm, i'm not sure"

So - i thought perhaps free postage?, except that everything i had ordered up to then had been free postage anyway.

So - not for me, i'll stick with 'ordinary'

From then on every time i ordered something i was "encouraged" to sign up for Prime, i always resisted but had to jump through more and more hoops until i ended up with an order that i just couldn't pay for without signing up for Prime.
I did manage to complete without joining, but it took me a good 10 mins or so to do it.

That's when i dumped Amazon (almost - b'cuz to be fair there was one product that i could only find on Amazon about a year ago so i bit the bullet and TBH there was no pressure to join Prime, so i did make the purchase, but i will not be bullied by anyone, it's my money, so as far as i am concerned, i i am in the driving seat (motoring connection ?? !! )

Yes, Amazon could say that they are protecting consumer interests by ... erm - saving themselves money by reducing Visa's charges - or they would have to increase their "costs"
which they would have passed onto us.

If Amazon "get rid" of Visa, what power does that give them over Mastercard ??

Maybe Visa /Mastercard /Amazon/ might not be worried about losing a customer like me, but i left Sky 12 years ago and i still get one letter a year asking me to re-join. l left the AA 2 years ago and have since had two letters a year asking me to re-join, so i'm not sure that "marginal" customers like me don't matter to the big boys.

One last thing -
I have just ordered a Mandolline from a previously used reputable UK supplier, i couldn''t resist comparing it with the same product on Amazon, and i have paid £10 less than their best. ............. and i paid with Visa.
 Decision reversed - smokie
www.bbc.com/news/business-60022166

Not completely off the table but looking that way. according top the Beeb
 Decision reversed - smokie
And now resolved

www.bbc.com/news/business-60413957
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