Excessive card surcharges to be banned by end of 2012
Thread Starter
Joined: May 2011
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From: IOM
Excessive card surcharges to be banned by end of 2012
News article : BBC News - Excessive card surcharges will be banned, says Treasury
Seems like a milestone. Good news indeed.
Seems like a milestone. Good news indeed.
Joined: Aug 2010
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From: Australia
If one embeds a modest merchant fee into the price of the goods or service this sort of thing doesn't seem to get noticed and therefore not complained about. However, when a business adds on the merchant fee including a common handling fee over and above the price of the goods or services, it then is at risk. Typically here in Oz, the great majority of times the consumer will not know how much is being charged as the fee does not appear anywhere on invoices or receipts. Much of the time no fee at all is charged separately at POS, it is absorbed into the costs. Many businesses here simply will not accept Amex for they charge multiples of the mainstream. It's ok if you can get away with it but I feel public opinion has caught them up.
Joined: May 2009
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From: Confoederatio Helvetica
Define excessive. i.e. Is it only the merchant fee, or can other costs such as hardware/software for processing the transaction be included? What about costs of the Reservations system for taking your booking, and costs for Internet, etc etc
Don't get me wrong I think that all these costs should be bundled into the price, but we all know that a certain Irish twit is going to do what he can to play the game for as long as he can. The media will love it giving Cryanair lots and lots of Free publicity.
Don't get me wrong I think that all these costs should be bundled into the price, but we all know that a certain Irish twit is going to do what he can to play the game for as long as he can. The media will love it giving Cryanair lots and lots of Free publicity.
Joined: Dec 2005
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From: Isle of Man
What is fundamentally wrong with these charges is that a real alternative, no charge, method of payment is not available. Yes the clever players may accept some obscure card at no charge, but it is not an option for most people. Obviously you can't pay by cash or cheque...
Debit cards, which are supposed to replace cheques, should be free, but that offends the bankers pricing model that envisaged gouging new fees from their use. Credit cards, whose charges are generally percentage based, might reasonably be recharged. But the retailer/airline conveniently forgets the original raison d'etre for these things which was to remove the legions of machine operators in the sales ledger department and the associated cost, together with the acceleration of cash flow.
Pleased to see some action, but expect new devices to extract the same money under a different guise to follow.
Debit cards, which are supposed to replace cheques, should be free, but that offends the bankers pricing model that envisaged gouging new fees from their use. Credit cards, whose charges are generally percentage based, might reasonably be recharged. But the retailer/airline conveniently forgets the original raison d'etre for these things which was to remove the legions of machine operators in the sales ledger department and the associated cost, together with the acceleration of cash flow.
Pleased to see some action, but expect new devices to extract the same money under a different guise to follow.
Joined: May 2009
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From: Confoederatio Helvetica
Et voila RyanAir sticks two fingers up at order to slash credit and debit card fees | Mail Online
It's not a cc/dc charge it's an administration charge ...
It's not a cc/dc charge it's an administration charge ...
Joined: Nov 2009
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From: UK
Its not a sustainable claim as I am sure it will be shown, as the absence of a charge when using a Ryanair prepaid card will show.
If it truly is an admin fee, then the admin cost should be the same for all cards of the same class i.e. debit or credit.
If it truly is an admin fee, then the admin cost should be the same for all cards of the same class i.e. debit or credit.
Joined: Sep 2008
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From: Blighty
If it is an admin fee and not related to the form of payment presumably it has to be treated as a non optional cost and thus included in the headline price rather than added on at the last stage of the payment process
Joined: Jul 2006
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From: 32°55'22"S 151°46'56"E
All we want is straight pricing, if Ryanair is that cheap, then surely it can offer the price it advertises as the rock bottom price you pay without any 'MANDATORY' charges unless you buy its special card or whatever crap, that should be a discounted rate. How can you compare like for like???
Joined: May 2007
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From: Europe
The various "charges" imposed by airlines in the UK, loco, Flybe and legacy, are nothing other than the fare distributed under other names so that the so-called headline fare is as low as possible.
This reflects the airlines' assessment of their customers' intelligence. And perhaps there are still people who believe that the published "fare" is a real figure.
There was never any point in protesting that the "taxes" are, apart from APD, simply various charges made by airports and handing companies to the airline, or that "credit card charges", "booking fees" and so on are 100 times the actual cost, or that "baggage charges" are far higher than the cost of carrying and handling the baggage, or that "printing your boarding card" does not actually cost £60.
It's all the cost of the seat from A to B. Get over it.
Legislating to prevent one of these charges being more that a completely undefinable cost will achieve nothing apart from transferring the charge to a new and equally absurd, imaginary service..
Legislating effectively to put the whole cost up front in the advertising and booking process would achieve a lot in terms of avoiding wasting everyone's times and bandwidth finding out what the whole cost is going to be. South West in Plymouth did just that, and it didn't do them any h.......... Sorry, scrub that.
This reflects the airlines' assessment of their customers' intelligence. And perhaps there are still people who believe that the published "fare" is a real figure.
There was never any point in protesting that the "taxes" are, apart from APD, simply various charges made by airports and handing companies to the airline, or that "credit card charges", "booking fees" and so on are 100 times the actual cost, or that "baggage charges" are far higher than the cost of carrying and handling the baggage, or that "printing your boarding card" does not actually cost £60.
It's all the cost of the seat from A to B. Get over it.
Legislating to prevent one of these charges being more that a completely undefinable cost will achieve nothing apart from transferring the charge to a new and equally absurd, imaginary service..
Legislating effectively to put the whole cost up front in the advertising and booking process would achieve a lot in terms of avoiding wasting everyone's times and bandwidth finding out what the whole cost is going to be. South West in Plymouth did just that, and it didn't do them any h.......... Sorry, scrub that.
Paxing All Over The World
Joined: May 2001
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From: Hertfordshire, UK.
It's all in the same bag as: Now under £200! (price tag = £199.95)
Why are so many products priced at £9.99 / £12.99 etc.? Because the retailers have learnt that it sells more boxes of stuff.
People want to pay less, because that is a well developed facet of human nature. They will be attracted to prices that look like a bargain. If they find that it is less of a bargain - they might then feel 'closer' to the product and so decide to buy it anyway.
Howsoever it works - it plainly works. End of story.
Why are so many products priced at £9.99 / £12.99 etc.? Because the retailers have learnt that it sells more boxes of stuff.
People want to pay less, because that is a well developed facet of human nature. They will be attracted to prices that look like a bargain. If they find that it is less of a bargain - they might then feel 'closer' to the product and so decide to buy it anyway.
Howsoever it works - it plainly works. End of story.
Joined: Sep 2007
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From: United Kingdom
From what I understand, if buying a number of tickets from someone like Ticketmaster (for example), any "credit card admin charge" is only added *once* to the final total, rather than against every single ticket. When the Beeb reported on this, what was going on was that one person was making a group booking, and that "admin charge" was added to *every name* in the booking - rather than once against the whole transaction. THAT hardly seems fair...
Joined: Nov 2008
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From: Exit stage right.
Its not a sustainable claim as I am sure it will be shown, as the absence of a charge when using a Ryanair prepaid card will show.
If it truly is an admin fee, then the admin cost should be the same for all cards of the same class i.e. debit or credit.
If it truly is an admin fee, then the admin cost should be the same for all cards of the same class i.e. debit or credit.
Joined: Nov 2004
Posts: 1,267
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From: uk
Easy get out is to include a discount by using a specific card...........now illegal in that.
Paxing All Over The World
Joined: May 2001
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From: Hertfordshire, UK.
Reading this makes it look likethat the new policy is pretty much like the old policy.
BBC News - Easyjet amends its booking charge
EXTRACTS
BBC News - Easyjet amends its booking charge
EXTRACTS
Previously, Easyjet charged £8 for all bookings made with a debit card, except for those by Visa Electron. The charge for credit cards was £8 plus 2.5% or £4.95, whichever was greater.
Now all bookings will be subject to a £9 administration fee, to end the link to payment options, and be clear at the start of the booking process. The fee will not be affected by the number of passengers on each booking.
Now all bookings will be subject to a £9 administration fee, to end the link to payment options, and be clear at the start of the booking process. The fee will not be affected by the number of passengers on each booking.
Advertising will include the fee, but adverts will often include prices based on the cost per person for a family of four. There will still be an additional charge for credit card users to cover the extra handling costs.
The consumers' association Which?, which initially raised the issue in a supercomplaint to the OFT, said that Easyjet's move was a "step in the right direction".
"Although it is unclear why this charge for administration cannot simply be included in the cost of the flight, at least now people can see upfront what they'll pay in total," a Which? spokesman said.
"Although it is unclear why this charge for administration cannot simply be included in the cost of the flight, at least now people can see upfront what they'll pay in total," a Which? spokesman said.
Joined: Jul 2006
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From: 32°55'22"S 151°46'56"E
"Although it is unclear why this charge for administration cannot simply be included in the cost of the flight, at least now people can see upfront what they'll pay in total," a Which? spokesman said.
Next when you go to buy a sandwich, you'll have a breakdown of the ingredients and how much each costs and a surcharge for eating it.
Joined: Dec 2005
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From: Isle of Man
Indeed. The "Administration Fee" in L'aviateur's sandwich analogy is a charge made for taking your money and putting it in the till. And they don't have to give out change...
FlyBe use a similar ploy, calling it a "Transaction Fee". High time these devices were consolidated into the base fare as they are unavoidable by the majority of customers.
FlyBe use a similar ploy, calling it a "Transaction Fee". High time these devices were consolidated into the base fare as they are unavoidable by the majority of customers.
Joined: Apr 2007
Posts: 161
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From: Malaga
High time these devices were consolidated into the base fare as they are unavoidable by the majority of customers
