Consumer alert: Minimum Purchase Hall of Shame

[marnen]

It has just come to my attention that credit card companies frown on merchants imposing those pesky minimum credit-card purchase requirements. In fact, they don't allow merchants to do this at all.

So what am I doing about it? Well, first of all, I am reporting merchants who do this (see here for how to do that), but there's another part too. I have created the Minimum Purchase Hall of Shame for people to share information about these merchants and whom they have been reported to. It's just a LJ community at the moment, but I have plans for a nice searchable database of these folks. So...get out there and start reporting merchants who break the rules!

Comments

[jannyblue.livejournal.com]

Just a note:

American Express allows minimum purchase requirements if (and only if) the store takes ONLY American Express cards.

[featheredfrog.livejournal.com]

Ever wondered WHY some merchants impose these minima? It's certainly NOT to be "pesky" to their paying customers. No sane merchant would do that. Merchants cut close margins anyway. Sometimes, on small sales, the fees on the cards are more than any margin at all. The solution other than a purchase minimum is to either

1. Impose a fee on small (or all) credit card sales

   Not permitted by the card companies, either...

2. Raise prices across the board

   This means cash-customers are subsidising your cc convenience, and let's not forget "Wally's has it cheaper..."

3. Offer a discount for Cash

   "Discriminating" against the CC user, and, incidentally, prohibited by "the rules", too

4. Eliminate Credit Cards entirely

   You KNOW what that would do for sales

So what's a merchant giving you good prices to do? IMO the merchant is offering you an additional service by accepting your CC -- you SHOULD be paying for it.