NEW Major chain restaurant to accept Bitcoins?

[ParrotyBit]

I really do have to wonder what sort of advantage paying via Bitcoin has at a restaurant. You lose the speed and visible tips of cash, and the credit aspect of a credit card. Extracting money from an exchange is likely to incur more of a loss than credit card fees would, too, and without the fraud protection both consumers and vendors receive from the credit card companies.

Bitcoin doesn't need to be the end-all payment solution to have a place in the world. They've found their niche, which happens to be the Silk Road, online gambling, and anonymous purchases of data. Aside from hoping people will invest in BTC to increase the price, I don't think there's a valid reason to want restaurants to deal in BTC rather than the local currency that you all have anyway. Just because I think chopsticks are great doesn't mean I'm going to insist on drinking soup or eating curry with them, after all.

[ParrotyBit]

You're thinking too hard. Consider it like Subway sandwich stamps. Is there a high propensity to fraud or delays with those? They're not cash.

Actually, yes. We don't have the Subway stamps anymore, at least in the United States. Care to guess why? (the URL will tell you anyway)
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8075754/ns/business-retail/t/fraud-stamps-out-subway-sandwich-promo/

Generally, protection against fraud in this country when using cash isn't an implementation issue, it's a "going to send people with guns to your door" issue. With credit cards, the protection is subsidized by people who aren't paying their balances on time. With checks, there really isn't much protection at all. You've got to see their ID, and the retribution by a company consists of "going to put a drawing of you next to the register". Check fraud is so bad that most restaurants simply won't accept them.

Bitcoin essentially functions like a check that you have to buy hardware to accept. Confirmation time is not instantaneous, so there's no guarantee a modified handheld payment device hasn't shifted money around immediately before the purchase. You don't even check their (fake) ID! While the confirmation time is less than a physical check, it's still greater than the time it takes to saunter to your car and drive off.

Asking a restaurant to accept Bitcoins is like asking them to start accepting checks again.

[BitcoinPorn]

I really do have to wonder what sort of advantage paying via Bitcoin has at a restaurant.

I think it is more or less the end game being the ability to pull out my cell phone and have a qr code that I scan or that is scanned, transaction done, less fees than credit card, the most instant transaction you can get.

[fivebells]

The specialtys respondent almost certainly didn't understand the risks a bitcoin payment system carries.  They probably thought it was a novel way to transfer US dollars.  I would give five to one against the "further consideration and review" leading to an actual implementation.

[FreeMoney]

I really do have to wonder what sort of advantage paying via Bitcoin has at a restaurant.

I think it is more or less the end game being the ability to pull out my cell phone and have a qr code that I scan or that is scanned, transaction done, less fees than credit card, the most instant transaction you can get.

This is cool and will be done imo. But the killer app of bitcoin is not going to be paying people who you could hand something to anyway. It's got to have to do with the fact that you can send it just as easily to Egypt as Japan as 3 miles away.

[MemoryDealers]

Asking a restaurant to accept Bitcoins is like asking them to start accepting checks again.

I think you have forgotten about "Green Addresses"
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=32818.0


It's the Bitcoin equivalent of a cashiers check,  but even more secure, and easier to use.