Whenever I use a debit card at an ATM other than from my home bank I get hit with a fee, so I never even thought about using one at a grocery store. Would there be a fee?
As for credit cards, I know the merchant pays a flat fee plus a percentage on every transaction so out of kindness to them I pay cash for relatively small purchases. Also, slow as I might be with my cash, the card payers are usually slower, trying to figure out which buttons to push, not noticing when it’s time to sign, etc.
I use my bank card often enough, but it’s still nice to have a bit of cash on hand for things like chip trucks or helping a colleague who’s selling chocolate covered almonds for his kid’s hockey team or something. To be honest, the cafeteria where I work only started accepting bank cards in the last couple of months, and it’s only been a year or two since Tim Hortons started accepting bank cards. No, were not a backward country, but these are some specific examples why having cash is, or at least was a requirement.
It is still a huge pain in the butt to get cards cancelled and changed over. Besides you still have to prove the charges were fraudulent, which might or might not be easy depending on your bank or cc issuer.
Day-um. There are people who actually so slow they really can’t figure out a purchase total + 7% in their heads Before the line gets to them? They can’t to a quick by-feel pocket coin count?
Do they have sheets of paper taped to their backs saying ‘Rob Me’?
I mean, is this an out of practice thing, an “I smoked weed all through school” thing or a “Dad’s my own Grand-Pa” thing? Its either lazy or disability or dumbassery or some % of each equaling 100%.
Freedom. Not paying for the service through some other fee (there’s ALWAYS some other fee). Tell me you don’t toss away 10% of your money to Coinstar because you’re too lazy to count your own money… :eek:
Here, I’ll save you money… toss me 5% of your total net worth and I’ll count it for you. I’ll save you money & I promise not to whistle too loudly on the way to the bank…
There is not a fee for using a debit card in a store that accepts them.
There is a fee for using cards in ATM’s that don’t normally accept the network associated with your card.
Using a debit card as a debit card (entering a PIN to purchase) costs the store owner far less than using a credit card. When asked by the merchant, I always use my card as a debit card to save the merchant money.
Depends. If you use your debit option where you enter your PIN, you may have to pay a fee (sometimes $1) to your bank. You would have to check with your bank to see if they charge a service fee for debit use at POS. If you use the credit option (most debit cards have a VISA or MC logo on them) where you sign for your purchase, there’s likely no fee to you and it processes to the merchant like any other CC purchase.
I use the CC option all the time, or will use the debit option when I want cash back.
Day-um. There are people out there who don’t know different municipalities charge different percentages for different things? Yeah, in Chicago I can eyeball the total of my shopping cart, but not everything in there is charged the same tax rate. Some is 2.25% and some is 9.25%, and alcohol is a different number per gallon depending on the type. And no, I’m not about to be bothered to figure out which is which. Stop in at a suburban gas mart and it’s a different set of taxes. So. No.
I was behind a dude a while back who* wanted to go out to his car to get the exact change *rather than getting some coins back. I said, “Just take the change- I’m waiting here!” The cashier just gave him the bills and told him to go get the fourteen cents. She then closed the drawer and went back to ringing up the line of people. I was in my car before the guy made it back in the store.
Many of the comments about paying slowly counting out change were common 35 years ago when I was a teen. I didn’t want to be my grandmother either. I quickly learned strategies to quickly count out change. If I can’t find that penny or nickel is the first couple seconds then I just hand over a bill.
I can understand younger people not using cash. I’m approaching 50. I grew up using cash. I didn’t have a credit card until college. They used to give college students a preferred application for their very first credit card. I was out of school and working before my bank issued my first debit card. I use plastic, but not for small purchases under 30 bucks.
This is absolutely false in my world. Any purchase under fifty dollars doesn’t even require a signature. I just swipe the card, wait for the screen to say “approved” and I’m done. No buttons to push and nothing to sign.
Actually time the next red light you see. People kill each other rather than waste a precious 10 seconds of their lives.
I will pull a handful of coins from my right front pocket (right-handed) and pick off a few if doing so avoids getting yet another 70 cents in change.
I moved into a house in 1982, moved out 2008. Despite using change for my morning fix at the vending machine (cola and chips - breakfast of the true bachelor), I had accumulated $58 in change. Bless Coinstar
Is it really that hard? I know the tax rate of every L.A. County city I do business in.
While I usually use a debit card, when I sense it will be even faster, I use exact change. I put the exact total (with tax pre-calculated) on the counter, and I start walking out before the the cashier has even finished ringing the purchase up (no bag or receipt for me, thank you). I’m usually faster than those debit card lovers, still there trying to remember their PIN.
I pay in exact change when possible. Coins get heavy and if I’m not allowed to use them to pay for a transaction, which seems to be what some posters are suggesting, how do I get rid of them? If a purchase comes to $10.70, I’ll tender $20.70 because I’d rather have a ten dollar note back than a five dollar note and a pile of coins.
Plus this link to the County alcohol tax. Plus state excise taxes found here, liquor or wine $8.55/gal, beer $0.23/gal. Plus whatever the Federal tax is which I can’t be bothered to look up right now.
Oh, and don’t forget the candy tax, which defines a KitKat as “food,” 1%, and a Hershey bar as “candy,” 6.25%.
So no. A simple trip to the grocery store, if I want to figure out to the penny what my total will be, so I can have coins already counted out before the total shows on the register? Not gonna happen. I’ll certainly have the change in my hand and ready, but the sops behind me are just gonna have to suck up those extra 5 seconds it takes to count and hand it to the clerk.
I’m a bit paranoid about giving annoyance to customers waiting behind me, by prolonging the transaction; and am bad at arithmetic; and am clumsy – dropping coins all over the place, can easily happen: so I usually hand over cash in biggish, “rounded” units, and let exact change be the cashier’s problem. And this is in a country where “the price is what it says on the ticket”. How I’d cope with your American lunacy involving taxes on top of everything, I do not know…
My Google-fu is weak, but in the back of my head there is a story about a scam in the U.K. in the 1960s or early 70s which worked off people giving the exact change because then the cashier didn’t have to open the till.
Another reason I like self checkouts. My grocery store has long lines except for the self checkout. I whizz through and if I wanna empty my pocket of change and small bills I’m not holding anyone up.
Coins in my pocket are an annoyance; I spend them ASAP. I only pay cash for small transactions, i.e. less than $5 or so. If I’m buying one or two items, or if there’s a line ahead of me that gives me a moment to think, I can calculate the tax and (if possible) get exact change ready before I even arrive at the register.
Nobody is likely to be involved in a fatal rear-end collision while counting out exact change at the sales register.
