Yes, but I meant that there’s a guarantee up to limit.
Disagree, China’s one is currently under rollout.
They would have probably taken Maestro & V-Pay too.
I’ve seen German banks seem to offer standalone Girocards or are moving to co-brand with debit Mastercard or Visa debit.
Girocard and Maestro were last issued in Germany about two years back.
It is a bit confusing now. The food outlet at our gate in Hamburg a few weeks back said ‘we don’t take cards’ but did take German EC cards although I gather they also haven’t been issued for a couple of years. We also found one branch of a supermarket who could only take those cards at their tills as seemingly the till considered any other debit cards as credit cards which they didn’t take.
Sounds similar to the fun and games we used to have when Mastercard rebranded Switch as SwitchMaestro then worse still Maestro UK.
Some EPOS terminals, including the ones in the shop I worked in, forced the buyer to select whether to use Maestro UK or Maestro Intl - normally prompting a delay while they were waiting for ‘Enter PIN’ and I was waiting them to enter their PIN; which was annoying. More annoying was for the other situation where Maestro Intl was not enabled which meant non Switch Maestro cardholders wouldn’t be able to get an approval.
Saddest thing I ever saw was some years back when chip cards came out. They’d been in France for years before that but French cards weren’t EMV originally. Come the change in France you had non EMV french cards and EMV french cards which were both processed the same. But then you had mag stripe cards, chip cards that weren’t EMV, chip and signature cards and zero guidance from the bank.
Net effect of the confusion was that the touristy village next to us gave up on taking cards altogether and just pointed people at the ATM. Mainly tourists who generally just walked away as they had credit cards (France didn’t have credit cards then). Sad thing was that the shops ended up closing and couldn’t understand why the tourists weren’t using the ATM.
That is pretty depressing
Decided to get a takeaway from a previously unvisited Chinese on the way back from the pub tonight. Of course, they didn’t take cards and, having assumed I would only be going to the pub, I didn’t have any cards with me. Fortunately my mate had his bank card and was able to lend me some 
. First time I have had to use cash money in ages.
Strange thing is that they would probably have accepted a Just eat order paid with a card 
Not really, if they want to be on Just Eat thems are the breaks - nothing an individual merchant can do about it (other than just not be on there) but on the flipside the huge platform fees cover all the processing costs and “complexity” (if you can call it that); they’ll just have whatever’s left sent to their bank account.
It’s pretty borderline as to whether just accepting cash is a viable way of doing business now, hopefully very soon it won’t be.
Like here in Germany presently, it’s all about tax avoidance.
Germans have a massive mistrust of cards, but it’s getting (slightly) better. You still encounter the odd shop that only accepts EC-Karte, but I have encountered shops that only accept German credit and debit cards - not because it’s physically impossible, but because they don’t trust foreigners
Same reason that German firms will not accept SEPA payments from outside Germany, though, bizarrely, the same firms kick off when other country’s firm don’t accept them from Germany…
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Just ask for it and writing and after they provide it, let them know that if they can’t change that you’ll be forced to tell the local German regulator that ensures SEPA IBAN must be respected
That’s the theory. It usually involves a flat refusal. I am unaware that any regulator has ever enforced a firm to accept a SEPA transfer, despite a variety of people making a lot of noise about it
Said shops will soon find that they can’t take any cards not too long from now as EC cards aren’t issued anymore.
With the transition Visa/MC I saw a few people who couldn’t get their head around that these come in debit and credit versions and tried to get cashback on a credit card.
You can also find the German equivalent of Trading Standards potentially, since it’s a law of trading too?
Like for example re/ card fees: I’ve reported a number of merchants and they are very aggressive on enforcement
Although I am still waiting on my report of JamDoughnut charging processing fees for cards (via lower cashback, in effect a cash discount (which are also barred)) to be enforced
Is this similar to IBAN discrimination like mentioned here?
I gather it was/is/has been a huge issue in Spain for many years. I’ve been told on several occasions by acquaintances that have lived/worked in Spain, that paying tax is considered laughably lax.
As I’ve said previously, I’m no fan of physical cash because quite simply, I no longer use it. All of my debit cards are frozen for ATM withdrawals too.
It is. In theory you can do something about it, like people refusing to take Scottish cash. In reality, it’s too much of a faff
I don’t actually think you can do anything about that besides get an English note, as Scottish notes aren’t legal tender even in Scotland iirc
That and actually, you only need to accept legal tender for debts, if I see you getting a Scottish note out and decide I don’t like your tie, I can refuse both your money because I don’t want cash or because I think your tie is rubbish
IBAN discrimination however is actually a thing that’s illegal, so hey-ho
Nationwide ATMs accept NI and Scottish notes UK wide. What I don’t know is if they issue those notes to the next person doing a withdrawal.