Weird retail or service industry policies...

Your card agreement is obviously different to mine then.

For my CC, if I am not taking proper care of my card, I am responsible for the charges.

Of course, it’s not always that straightforward and card companies will normally work with you BUT, just saying “that card was stolen, and I didn’t know” doesn’t get you off the hook.

Burger King has made a very successful entrance into the Trinidad&Tobago market over the past several years, locations have been expanding.

A while back every single location put up posters and banners outside advertising they now serve breakfast sandwiches just like in the USA, including putting the breakfast stuff on the menu. I occasionally have a craving for a greasy egg bisquit but have never found one store actually selling them.

First they said despite the sign they didn’t serve breakfast til 11am, just 9am. Then they said that headquarters never sent the stuff to make breakfast, then they said they decided to only sell it for an hour after opening. I have never actually been able to get breakfast, I’m pretty sure aside from the advertisements no breakfast foods were ever sent out.

Why?

Tell me about it! I run into this bizarre shit in Trinidad all the time, hardly a sleepy island. Retail people will literally say shit like “uh that is such a hot seller I quit reordering” and then they scream and howl when international chains or professionally run chains come in and run them out of business.

It is like they don’t understand the basics of retail, I mean upset at a hot seller?

Our family hairdresser used to only accept cash, and I wondered if they were underreporting their income… :stuck_out_tongue: They started taking cards earlier this year, however.

And yes, it was a bit of a hassle remembering to have cash, especially for something like a cut-and-color session which isn’t cheap. But they do such a good job, and their prices are reasonable, so we put up with it.

That’s crazy. If its that much trouble raise the price to make it worthwhile.

A guy with his own store may have different motivations. Maybe he’s just looking to get out of the house for a few hours and chat with with the customers. That will work if he is the only store in town, but corporations know there’s money to be made and will take all the business they can get.

It reminds me of the demise of small hardware stores. While their staff was very knowledgeable and gave great advice, they had odd hours, an odd assortment of inventory, never really had everything I needed, and returns could be a hassle. Then Home Depot comes to town with their massive stores, computer controlled inventory, and no-hassle returns. The small stores could have survived if they somehow optimized to their niche, but instead they just complained about their loss of business and closed up.

I don’t rely on cashiers for “peace of mind”. If the card issued to me is lost or stolen, I’ll report it and the company will cancel it immediately and reissue a new card with a new number. My deal is with my card issuer, and they say I do not need to show a merchant ID in order to use my card.

When a cashier asks me for ID, I politely remind them that it is against the rules and if they insist, I file a complaint with the card issuer. When the card issuer responds to the complaint agreeing with me, they also notify the merchant. For added effect, I send a copy certified mail to corporate, the manager, consumer affairs and whoever else I can think of that might be useful.

I’m with you.

Part of the reason I use a credit card is that it’s convenient. When the cashier insists on seeing an ID, I gotta dig through my purse yet again, find my ID (which is rarely used, so no as accessible as my credit card), give it to them, and put it away again. I’d really prefer it if they just ran the flippin’ card and let me and the credit card company worry about fraud.

Jeez, what an ordeal over being asked for ID. You must be a riot at parties.

And you know what happens next?

Absolutely nothing!

The merchant carries on as before, the card issuer takes no further action, and people like you just get to make another complaint a few weeks later. Basically, almost no merchants ever have their ability to take cards revoked because they ask for ID.

The card issuers are more interested in the revenue they get from the transactions than they are in actually enforcing this particular part of the merchant agreement. They might tut-tut and sympathize with you when you make your complaint, but they’re not actually going to do anything about it.

And yet, as people have already pointed out, it’s not just you and the company that have to “worry about fraud.” If fraudulent transactions take place, it’s often the merchant who ends up eating the cost.

That’s not unusual where I live, particularly for small shops. In fact,I think it’s the rule.

Do you get two days scheduled off a week? Why shouldn’t your barber?

Rather than continuing this sidetrack, I started a poll: Showing ID…

If fraudulent transactions take place, most of the time the credit card company eats the cost. The merchant simply has to prove that it followed the acceptance procedure outlined in the card service agreement. If the merchant followed all of the procedures and can produce a signed receipt, then the merchant will not be charged back. The cost of absorbing fraud is one of the drivers of credit card fees in general.

Complaining to the card issuer does nothing, though not for the reasons you might say. The card issuer has no relationship with the merchants. This relationship is owned by the card acquirer and/or processor. The card issuer simply can’t just call the merchant and complain because that would violate the terms of the contract it has with the entity that signs the merchant up for credit card transactions in the first place. The issuer can’t pester the merchant any more than a merchant can pester a cardholder.

Which, of course, means that merchants have even more motivation to check for ID, given that they are the ones who see the card fees coming out of every transaction.

We might simply be running into a question of terminology here.

How are you using these terms? Does the following reflect your terminology:

[ul]
[li]Card issuer = issuing bank, store, company, credit union, etc. (e.g., Bank of America, Sears, United Airlines, Navy Federal Credit Union)[/li]
[li]Card Acquirer/Processor = the card companies (Visa, Mastercard, etc)[/li][/ul]
Or are you using the terms differently?

To be honest, i don’t think it matters much either way. Neither the individual issuing institutions, nor the card companies themselves, have any real interest in shutting down merchants who ask for ID, and despite the fact that Visa and Mastercard both have procedures for filing complaints about merchants who ask for ID, they treat those complaints as little more than pro-forma exercises, and are really not interested in taking any concrete steps to enforce that part of the merchant agreement.

Along the same lines, my daughter’s orthodontist works 10am-4pm Monday through Friday. I can’t understand how they can expect kids to miss school every time they need their adjustment. Trying to get the 3-4 appointments are nearly impossible as every one wants them. Unfortunately, their hours changed after my daughter had the braces put on or I never would have gone to the office. If you cater to kids, having later hours and/or Saturday appointments make sense. I wouldn’t refer to him for this reason.

Correct. When a business is asking for ID it is protecting themselves just as much as the customer if not more. The customer can dispute the charge but the vendor still gets the money pulled away from them suffering the loss. The credit card companies don’t take the loss in most cases, the vendor does.

Exactly. And for a barber or a hairdresser, I think far more customers would rather have them open on Saturdays than on Mondays.

We seem to have some disagreement here.

Anyone know which of these positions is accurate?

I am not sure why you think that unless various credit card processing companies have different policies. I took a phone credit card to pay off a medical bill. The card holder disputed the charge and that money was out of my account by the next billing cycle. Because it was a service and not a tangible item, I could rebill the patient but if we were talking about a big screen tv, I would have been screwed.

Maybe there are different merchant agreements for different businesses? That is all I can think of.