In an episode of the Family Guy, Peter runs a restaurant. When a customer asks if the restaurant will accept the Discover Card, Peter says he would rather accept two live chickens or a jar of pennies worth less the bill than a Discover Card. There has also been a joke on The Simpsons about the Discover Card. These are just two examples of a general feeling that the Discover Card is a lesser credit card. Why does this attitude toward the Discover Card exist? Is there something wrong with the Discover Card?
A lot of places still don’t take it. I think it’s more expensive for a business. I use my extensively because they offer cash back, so I pretty much run all my expenses through it. Maybe businesses hate it, but I don’t think there is any bias out there against it as a “lesser” card. (As opposed to the coolness of American Express :rolleyes: ) If there is, I’ve never heard it.
Discover is still the least accepted, as compared to MasterCard/Visa. I try not to frequent places that won’t take Discover, as I try to put everything on one card.
My understanding is that Discover charges merchants a slightly higher percentage per purchase, and that is why some merchants won’t take Discover.
I think most card processing places make you pay separate for your Visa/Mastercard account, and your Discover account (mine actually makes me pay extra for AmEx too).
So lots of businesses chose not to pay extra to be able to process Discover cards, and would not accept them at their store.
Comedy writers wondered what is so bad about Discover that it should not be accepted in various locations, enough to make over-the-top jokes about how horrible it must be.
It’s true, at least on my merchant account.
As a consumer, we put everything–absolutely everything–on our Discover card, including utilities and cell phone accounts. We get 2% cash back on all purchases, so it means a return on nearly every expense we have. Pay it off in full every month and it’s a nice little chunk back at the end of the year.
It wasn’t accepted many places when it came out. They were in with Sears at first, and Sears refused to take any Master Card at that time to get you to get the Discover Card. That policy made me say screw Sears and Discover for pulling this heavy handed crap. Discover also had less favorable terms, so why choose it over a Master Card?
Less favorable terms? As a consumer or merchant? As a consumer, there is no annual fee and cash back. You can’t get much more favorable than that. I don’t even know what the interest rate is, since I pay it off every month. It is pretty rare now for me to have to use anything but Discover.
Merchants, I’ve heard that AmEx charges more also. Is that correct?
The last time I worked retail (about 10 years ago), it was true, at least of that particular retailer. FWIW, it was The Home Depot, the second largest retailer in the world.
There’s also the small problem with getting overseas merchants to accept Discover cards, unlike Visa and Mastercard that are accepted just about anywhere.
In the three years I spent in retail, I saw maybe a half-dozen Discover cards at most - and all belonged to American tourists. I worked for a US-based retailer, so IIRC we did indeed accept Discover, but it’s a rarity this side of the border.
Since this is just IME, it isn’t a scientific answer or anything, but where I work over half the CC’s I get are Mastercard…the rest are overwhelmingly Visa.
I get less than one Discover card per shift. Perhaps one Amex a shift, but even Amex is more popular than Discover; I can go a week without seeing a Discover card.
(I sort all CC receipts by company at the end of my shift, in case anyone finds it odd that I pay this much attention.)
I’ve always assumed it’s because Discover still isn’t accepted as widely, and it’s more difficult to get a Discover card. I could be wrong.
But I’ve never made any assumptions about people based on their freakin’ credit cards. (If it’s an Amex though I do look to see how long they’ve been card members, just because they’re the only card that displays that information.)
Please note I gave all this as past tense, when they were a rather new business. The Discover derisions are based on how they came across the first couple years. Start out on a bad footing with the public and they never let you forget it. The point of bad terms was from the consumer’s point. When I asked Sears about their policy a couple years later, a clerk said the Discover only policy was a disaster and it was changed.
The thing is, it was originally indeed a Sears creation (back when Sears Roebuck still owned financial operations – and itself, for that matter!), so it was viewed by many merchants as a glorified store card with which Sears was trying to make money out of people who were not shopping at Sears…
Hmm. We’ve had Discover from the time it was owned by Sears, and never had a problem. I remember a time when many department stores only took their own cards - in fact when we were just married we collected about 7 or 8 of store cards. Sears taking Discover only was a step up in my book from them taking Sears only.
How were the terms bad from the consumers point of view? Like I said, we got ours pretty early on, and were pretty happy with it. (We’ve had ours fore maybe 20 years or longer - long before Sears sold the business in 1993. (Wiki link ) It is definitely true that more places take it now than did back then - we only run into problems once a month or less.
Unfortunately this is true. It has excellent acceptance in major cities and in places where affluent Americans travel. Off that trail, and acceptance is not exactly universal.
Discover was my first credit card and still my preferred card. I pay it off every month and enjoy the cash back rewards.
In the States the only place we run into problems are at smaller places, like doctor’s offices. In Spain, there are some acceptance issues and tend to use our MC instead.
I’ve got a Discover card. Not sure why, though, as I never use it. Especially since Sam’s started accepting Mastercard. That decision also increased my purchasing at Sam’s. Win-win. If I take it out of the country, it doesn’t do squat for me either. Maybe I should just cancel it and see if I can hit 850.
