Contactless Card Minimum Spend

DonnySaver

How much longer will retailers be able to get away with charging a "minimum spend" for a contactless payment?

I've just been to a sandwich shop, saw they accepted contactless, tried to use my card and got told "It's a minimum £5 spend".

I thought the introduction of contactless cards was meant to do-away with these types of practises ??

Carrot007

As long as the banks charge them a per transaction fee making small transactions costly.

I supose they could just charge you 50p instead.

Shakin_Steve

My smallest regular spend is £1.80 for car parking in town.

eddddy

DonnySaver wrote: »

I've just been to a sandwich shop, saw they accepted contactless, tried to use my card and got told "It's a minimum £5 spend".

It seems especially daft for a sandwich shop to do this.

A big chunk of their business needs to be done in a very short space of time - around lunchtime. I would have thought that saving 5 or 10 seconds per customer by using contactless would make a noticeable difference to queuing times.

In fact, when contactless was first introduced, sandwich shops and coffee shops seemed to be some of the keenest people to take it on board.

photome

As has already been said if the retailer gets charged 50p a transaction, why wouldnt they have a minimum spend

King_Of_Fools

photome wrote: »

As has already been said if the retailer gets charged 50p a transaction, why wouldnt they have a minimum spend

But they should not get charged a flat fee anymore it should be a flat percentage of the total.

Nebulous2

I've gone from not seeing the point of contactless to using it regularly. Increased acceptance, no quibbles about smaller payments and the TSBs 5% all played a part in that. I carry less cash now.

If I found people imposing minimums that could change back though, especially as there isn't a financial incentive any longer.

blink18

photome wrote: »

As has already been said if the retailer gets charged 50p a transaction, why wouldnt they have a minimum spend

They eon t he o aging say where near 50p, more like 5p or less for a £5 transaction

PeacefulWaters

I'd assume the charge is nothing to do with contactless and everything to do with credit card (and possibly debit card) use.

chattychappy

DonnySaver wrote: »

How much longer will retailers be able to get away with charging a "minimum spend" for a contactless payment?

For as long as:
1) regulation and their merchant agreement allows them to; and
2) people switch to another payment method or increase their spend.

Bear in mind that some privately owned businesses prefer at least some of their transactions to be in cash so they can take home some untaxed income, pay bills for which they don't get receipts - the bloke that cleans the windows, the girl that helps them out but doesn't want to lose her benefits etc.

Anthorn

DonnySaver wrote: »

How much longer will retailers be able to get away with charging a "minimum spend" for a contactless payment?

I've just been to a sandwich shop, saw they accepted contactless, tried to use my card and got told "It's a minimum £5 spend".

I thought the introduction of contactless cards was meant to do-away with these types of practises ??

In fact the opposite is true or should be true. For a retailer contactless is cheaper than chip and pin. That led The Telegraph in 2015 to predict the disappearance of the £5 minimum spend levied on Debit card and Credit card transactions.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/shopping-and-consumer-news/11829581/Contactless-card-revolution-to-end-5-minimum-spend-in-shops-and-pubs.html

Worldpay too advises that contactless is cheaper than chip and pin and advises retailers to provide it as a way of saving money.
(PDF document) http://www.worldpay.com/sites/default/files/Contactless-made-easy.pdf

Personally, I have never experienced a £5 minimum spend with contactless but I have with chip and pin. When the £5 minimum spend was attempted with chip and pin I put my goods back on the shelves, left the store and went elsewhere. I'll do the same with any contactless minimum spend levy.