Why 2.5% charge for paying for a holiday with a credit card?

jussiep

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

There isn't a "£100 payment" requirement.

The 'item cost' has to be between £100 and £30K, but you can pay as little as £1 (or even less!) on a credit card, if the retailer will accept it, and secure section 75 protection...subject to there being a qualifying debtor-creditor-supplier (D-C-S) relationship of course.

Thanks for clarifying very useful to know for the future. Thankyou for being helpful

podperson

Most card processing companies charge a percentage fee on credit card payments whereas debit cards are a lower fixed fee per payment. The company I work for never used to charge for taking credit card payments but now we've had to put in a surcharge as we were losing thousands the last few years on card fees. This isn't extra money being taken into the company, it's simply to pay for the fee being charged by card processing.

StuC75

Alternatively Tesco build that charge into the prices.

So next be asking for a discount for paying cash \ debit card payment..

Credit Card Surcharges are not Hidden, its quite clear what they are.. What would you rather do pay more for the holiday, because they factor in that you May pay by card?

Because the card provides a level of protection, then view the charge as the premium that you are paying for that facility..

dld2s wrote: »

I'm sure Tesco only asked for the ticketed price for the bananas and didn't add a charge, so not really the same is it, the op was not buying a 2.5% credit card charge

meer53

The cost of processing your banana purchase is already included in the price of the bananas ! You're not getting away with anything !

"I'm sure Tesco only asked for the ticketed price for the bananas and didn't add a charge, so not really the same is it, the op was not buying a 2.5% credit card charge"

chattychappy

dld2s wrote: »

I'm sure Tesco only asked for the ticketed price for the bananas and didn't add a charge, so not really the same is it, the op was not buying a 2.5% credit card charge

Well... most people don't particularly value "protection" when buying bananas (and the transaction value is likely to be under £100). But just because it's free to use a CC at Tescos, doesn't mean it should be free as of right.

In the OPs case, (s)he clearly values the benefits of convenience/protection and this is what the surcharge buys:

jussiep wrote: »

I like to use a credit card for paying for holidays due to card protection and ease of payment.

but the OP didn't want to pay for it.

dld2s

chattychappy wrote: »

Well... most people don't particularly value "protection" when buying bananas (and the transaction value is likely to be under £100). But just because it's free to use a CC at Tescos, doesn't mean it should be free as of right.

In the OPs case, (s)he clearly values the benefits of convenience/protection and this is what the surcharge buys:



but the OP didn't want to pay for it.

And I agree with you that because it's free to use/built into the price at Tesco it doesn't mean it should be free as of right, in fact, I disagree with the OP, I am one of those who is quite happy to pay a little extra on a holiday for the extra protection a CC brings.

Lets not kid ourselves though you were trying to be sarcastic/take the pi** at the OP's Post, I thought this was wrong, hence my post where I pointed out that the example you used of buying bananas at Tesco was not the same as buying a holiday and getting a surcharge. honestly, I cant think of another reason for the way your post was written but If I got it wrong, my apologies, but as I say it's what came across to me at least,

jussiep

chattychappy wrote: »

Well... most people don't particularly value "protection" when buying bananas (and the transaction value is likely to be under £100). But just because it's free to use a CC at Tescos, doesn't mean it should be free as of right.

In the OPs case, (s)he clearly values the benefits of convenience/protection and this is what the surcharge buys:



but the OP didn't want to pay for it.

I was happy to pay for it just querying why it was so much.

jussiep

dld2s wrote: »

And I agree with you that because it's free to use/built into the price at Tesco it doesn't mean it should be free as of right, in fact, I disagree with the OP, I am one of those who is quite happy to pay a little extra on a holiday for the extra protection a CC brings.

Lets not kid ourselves though you were trying to be sarcastic/take the pi** at the OP's Post, I thought this was wrong, hence my post where I pointed out that the example you used of buying bananas at Tesco was not the same as buying a holiday and getting a surcharge. honestly, I cant think of another reason for the way your post was written but If I got it wrong, my apologies, but as I say it's what came across to me at least,

I am happy to pay too, just wondered why it was so high, thought it was worth mentioning in a post, but I guess not.
As for the bananas I think it was sarcasm but there you go.
I thought I had a valid post but I guess not I wont post any more.
Thank you to those of you who took me seriously and gave me some useful informatoin its very much appreated.

dld2s

jussiep wrote: »

I am happy to pay too, just wondered why it was so high, thought it was worth mentioning in a post, but I guess not.
As for the bananas I think it was sarcasm but there you go.
I thought I had a valid post but I guess not I wont post any more.
Thank you to those of you who took me seriously and gave me some useful informatoin its very much appreated.

I thought so to, it got discussed, you got some info you didn't know (and possibly so did others?) so that to me proves your post worthwhile.

PS I wouldn't stop posting because of a bit of sarcasm, you can get lots of valuable advice/info on these boards

chattychappy

My post wasn't meant to unfriendly or put people off, though I do agree it was a bit sarcastic.

The OP obviously feels that the charge was too much. "surely it doesn't cost the travel agent that much". Going back to my bananas example (dives for cover!), I'm sure Tescos don't charge for bananas what it costs them. They mark up. I think this is just business - hotels sell rooms, but mark up practically every extra they offer - cans of drink in the minibar, phone calls etc. In some businesses, CCs do cause problems because of spurious claims, chargebacks etc. When I was a merchant (different industry) we got chargebacks from people saying they hadn't got stuff we had sent them that we knew they had received. CCs didn't accept our delivery proofs. So we marked up CC acceptance by more than the direct cost simply because of risk/hassle. (We marked up 2.5% to 3%, but it cost us 1.8%. The cost was probably even more than 2.5%/3%, but of course there were costs with other methods too - people coming in with cash, cheque processing etc.)

For me, I think it's fair game for businesses to charge what they like. 10% surcharge is OK if it's clear prior to the point of sale. But whatever I think, the law has changed. Now they can only charge what it cost them. How far they can include chargeback type risks remains to be seen. But they can include an element of IT/technology costs insofar as they are directly attributable to CC acceptance.

I think the current situation is crazy - the new law is difficult to enforce by those it's designed to protect, because to know if you have been a "victim" you need to know the cost structure of your supplier.