Visa and Mastercard decided to increase their Fees.And there is nothing y can do

[lornadane]

It will be not easy for Bitcoin to overcome Visa or Mastercard's services! Because bitcoin is a volatile currency, people will not rely on its present price. Normal people will not accept the downtrend of the crypto market, they can be panic for it. To make bitcoin as the alternative payment way, BTC price should be stable for at least one year to show the world that BTC can be the first choice to make transactions in every sector!

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[qtronix]

I don't think digital money can seriously compete with Fiat money. Visa and MasterCard are very serious companies and the use of bitcoin will not change this situation. I think that cryptocurrency will exist as an alternative payment method, but it is too early to say that it will be used as widely as all centralized systems.

[pixie85]

There's a lot you can do. One of those things is not using credit cards. I do it very rarely. I have a bank account and I shop online but I pay directly from my account not with my card number. I don't even own a credit card because I didn't want to pay fees. The ones who will suffer are the merchants because they have to allow their clients to use credit cards and they have active terminals in stores. Maybe if less people used credit cards the fees would decrease.

[BitHodler]

There's a lot you can do. One of those things is not using credit cards.

People living from paycheck to paycheck don't have much of an option but to keep using credit cards to fill up gaps during the month. Millions and millions of people are stuck in a life of debt.

Regarding the increase in fees, it's something I saw coming with how there hasn't been much competition in that part of the industry. Less competition and large overall market dominance allow you to do these things.

Switching to Bitcoin isn't a viable option currently with how the price keeps fluctuating. Stability and more global acceptance is needed to convince people to at least give Bitcoin a fair shot.

But still, with the aforementioned in mind, people still rely on debt, and Bitcoin isn't the right tool to help them improve their financial situation. You have to take care of the underlying problem before you can move on.

[Em00n01]

This is very annoying. But if they increase the fee it will be a good news for crypto useres because If cryptocurrency can show it's power people will start using crypto as a payment method because of low fee and instant transection.

[squatter]

"Visa cards generated 54.06% of all purchase transactions on general purpose cards worldwide. Debit cards with the Visa brand continued to account for the most purchase transactions with a share of 34.82%, followed by Visa credit cards with 19.23%.

Mastercard debit cards had a 13.30% share, overtaking Mastercard credit cards with a 12.87% share. UnionPay credit cards had a 7.59% share, and UnionPay debit cards had a 7.32% share. American Express had a 2.81% share, followed by JCB cards with 1.15% and Diners Club/Discover cards with 0.91%".

https://www.paymentscardsandmobile.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Purchase-transactions-on-global-card-networks-2016-1.jpg

UnionPay only works in China. So I think it is possible to say Visa and MasterCard work like a duopoly. I think there is no place in the world that accept credit cards but do not accept Visa or Mastercard.

UnionPay is definitely expanding beyond China. Where I live in the US, it's becoming common to see their logo everywhere Visa/Mastercard is posted. I don't think UnionPay cards are being issued to US customers, so the Chinese tourist/expat market must be huge.

I wish I knew more about antitrust laws. I have no idea if they apply here.

[plvbob0070]

Visa, Mastercard mull increasing fees for processing transactions: WSJ

Visa Inc and Mastercard Inc, the two biggest U.S. card networks, are preparing to raise certain fees levied on U.S. merchants for processing transactions


They operate as a global duopoly. They operate a large chunk of global trade. They are ubiquitous on internet.  And they decide, without consulting anyone or without any justification, to increase their fee.

This is what centralized organizations will always make if they have the power to do. We need alternative means of payment to reduce that power and Bitcoin has to show itself as an alternative.

Since they are dominating and they know they have the market, its something you can predict that they'll use that advantage to increase its profit by increasing the transaction fee. It'll be hard for the consumer so it will be better if they find alternative one. And then there's bitcoin. But I don't think that most people would think bitcoin as their alternative.

[kryptqnick]

Visa Inc and Mastercard Inc, the two biggest U.S. card networks, are preparing to raise certain fees levied on U.S. merchants for processing transactions


They operate as a global duopoly. They account for much of global trade. And they decide, without consulting anyone or without any justification, to increase their fee.

This is what will always make centralized organizations that have this power. We need alternative means of payment to reduce that power and Bitcoin has to show itself as an alternative.

I completely agree on your thoughts.
The Visa and MasterCards company are really annoying its users completely. They are not stopping in to do so in any expects.
They keep on Increasing the fees as much they are capable of and we normal users are facing a lot of issues for that.
So we definitely need any alternate way of Payment at the moment.
It's time for Bitcoin now to show its Power.

I am with you on this matter. Lack of competition leads to bold unfair moves, because there's nobody around to make them stop. It should be noted, however, that from the article it is unclear who will have to pay the fees:

it is up to merchant banks if they want to pass on the fee hike to sellers, or absorb it themselves. Similarly, it is sellers’ discretion to pass on the hike to consumers or not

I hope the banks will take the fees, because they are already getting rich and making people pay regular fees to be cardholders. It's sad though that the banks can pass the fees over to merchants and they can pass them to their customers... That's another example of why centralization is bad. We see the hierarchy, and the ones on the lowest level of it are the most vulnerable.

[Teawhalee]

They already have the popularity and customer base all over the world. Its what people make use every day, minute and seconds. So because of this they can decide to do what they like at anytime. This is the disadvantage of centralized systems which give power to only the creators and owners.  This is why there is need for decentralized systems to be adopted so that everyone can be free to do what they like at any point in time and also there won't be any manipulation or monopoly systems.

[GreatOrchid]

This is exactly where cryptocurrencies should come in but we are still doing all we can to make sure the technology is fully accepted by the world. The decentralized nature of blockchain technology will ensure that no one manipulates prices for their personal gain.

Being decentralised the cryptocurrencies have a lot of benefits which can make them a best currency to bring into consideration but yet most of the governments would not make this happen. Our globe is centralised and making it decentralised is not that easy. To avoid the heavy charges with visa/mastercard, we should start adopting cryptocurrencies.

[Aura]

I hope that more merchants start to realize that they are being ripped of by this duopoly. The lightning network could be a nice alternative. It provides instant transactions with negligible fees, meaning that merchants will have a 2.5% improvement on revenue. It will be very though to adopt this in our society but definitely not impossible. We need some multinational corporations to adopt it into their system and then the rest will follow.

[franky1]

do you know the funny part.

banks hold the money. but its VISA/Mastercard demanding banks pay more..
maybe banks should just swap out visa/mastercard for a different service provider.

in the end its all about chargeback scamming and the costs involved. however by linking a card to things like applepay,square, stripe,

EG (how things evolved)
bank (bank is liable for charges)
bank <> debit card (debit card is liable for charges)
bank <> debit card <> phone app service (app service is liable for charges)

thus applepay(+others) handle the chargebacks.. meaning visa/mastercard dont. meaning end bank dont. meaning its just going to push people to prefer to link to things like applepay. to avoid the visa/mastercard excess charge by avoiding making visa/mastrcard liable.

this is what visa/mastercard want anyways. to push the risk off their shoulders for those that use an app as the risk taker, making visa/mastercard. just a zero risk middle service(pure profit)

but
eventually applepay(+others) when they start becoming more of the defacto payment method of fiat, and start to see their exposure to chargeback scamming increase. they too will start increasing their fee's to counter their liabilities

[sheenshane]

I hope that more merchants start to realize that they are being ripped of by this duopoly. The lightning network could be a nice alternative. It provides instant transactions with negligible fees, meaning that merchants will have a 2.5% improvement on revenue. It will be very though to adopt this in our society but definitely not impossible. We need some multinational corporations to adopt it into their system and then the rest will follow.

Well, hopefully, it will happen. If we will let blockchain to wreck this duopoly then blockchain will be the best alternative for card networks.
I think they are trying to raise the fees because the government is also asking some for them since they already own the market because of the duopoly. Well, this is very interesting if blockchain will get inside the card network industry and improve the fintech of the world.

[aceptamosbitcoin]

i want to raise a question regarding this, do you think it is a good thing for bitcoin?

them increasing fees they take from merchant to process their transactions means merchants have to increase their prices to cover the difference if they don't want to lose money or eat into their profit.

on the other hand using bitcoin doesn't have that fee. so if they get paid in bitcoin they can offer their goods at a "discount" and that can create incentive for people to make payment in bitcoin hence increasing adoption.

Not really.
Most of the population never used and will never use crypto of any kind. Even we, crypto users, usually are ending up with crypto - fiat conversion and paying with Visa/MC.
Nobody (big) retail will waste it times to make a special discounts for the tiny crypto population. Time is money.

[tbossmitche]

Seeing this post got me thinking. This really reinforces the reasoning behind financial institutions strongly kicking against blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies at large. The decentralized nature of the technology would not be able to feed their greed. You almost cannot expect better from centralized financial platforms as they simply portray the illusion that they truly care about their customers when all that concerns them is the size of their pockets. These type of institutions have grown to gain widespread popularity to the point where they believe people cannot do without. That is where the decentralized ecosystem comes in. But before the system is in full flow, we just have to make for with what we have.

[buwaytress]

There's a lot you can do. One of those things is not using credit cards.

People living from paycheck to paycheck don't have much of an option but to keep using credit cards to fill up gaps during the month. Millions and millions of people are stuck in a life of debt.

Regarding the increase in fees, it's something I saw coming with how there hasn't been much competition in that part of the industry. Less competition and large overall market dominance allow you to do these things.

Switching to Bitcoin isn't a viable option currently with how the price keeps fluctuating. Stability and more global acceptance is needed to convince people to at least give Bitcoin a fair shot.

But still, with the aforementioned in mind, people still rely on debt, and Bitcoin isn't the right tool to help them improve their financial situation. You have to take care of the underlying problem before you can move on.

Unfortunately, yes, I have to agree here. I hate the very idea of credit (and the impossible fees levied on credit) but myself, when I had access to credit, was forced many times to use it, usually through credit cards.

Coming from my part of the world too, if buying or paying for something in a country halfway across the world where the euro or even dollar or pound means my max debit card payment wasn't even enough to buy a plane ticket, and there's no option to pay with wire, the only way to pay for some of these things conveniently is Visa/MC.

As problematic as credit is, it's also made some day to day things possible. And people literally have no choice if they want to continue life normally.

The system needs fixing first.

[veleten]

not exactly bitcoin discussion related
but you got a point, huge corporations, especially monopolists like Mastercard and Visa
and yeah , i'm sure they are run by  one and same group of people just trying to avoid monoplism accusations
can do whatever they want, raise fees, turn your processing off , even threaten to exclude countries from their systems
as it has been discussed in regards of Russia and sanctions against it
my hope that one day cryptocurrencies will mature enough and have an infrastructure to challenge the supremacy of Visa and Mastercard in transactions processing

[Pursuer]

that is the centralized systems for you! they force anything they want on their users and the only thing their users can do is to complain but suck it up and continue being their slaves. this is why bitcoin and decentralization has been invented so that we don't have to remain their slaves and have that additional option of freedom if we choose to use it. that is also why we keep fighting to keep bitcoin decentralized because nobody wants to see it turned into another VISA,...

[kelz1]

At the moment it is free to own and use a credit card if you pay the bills on time. Soon a well established company will allow bitcoin or litecoin transactions on card to compete with visa

[talkbitcoin]

At the moment it is free to own and use a credit card if you pay the bills on time. Soon a well established company will allow bitcoin or litecoin transactions on card to compete with visa

the whole point of bitcoin is that you no longer need a centralized company to take control of your money and then allow you to use your own money (or not if they decided to block you!). in other words bitcoin does not need a card.

with that said bitcoin debit cards are already a similar thing!