this post was submitted on 27 Mar 2025
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Hey guys!

Visa and Mastercard are the 8th and 15th biggest companies in the world, worth more than 1.1T USD (!!!).

For any purchase made with a credit or debit cards and you give them 2-3% of your money.

That's one the biggest waste of money from EU you can imagine.

I'm trying to find viable alternatives but except paying cash it seem there is no real alternative. Even in where I live there is an alternate payment service but they take the money from my mastercard, duh...

And the idea would be to have something even my grandma can use, not some nerdy solution, any thoughts?

Edit: Bitcoin would be a solution if widely adopted, but more realistic would be something accepted by every cashier machine, and if possible using the NFC of your phone, a kind of "Apple/Google" Pay, that goes directly from your bank to the bank's shop. Where I live all debit cards are either visa or mastercard...

Edit2: There is an EU initiative that seem to be starting with WERO, never heard of it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Payments_Initiative

Edit3: It seem that Paysafecard and Skrill are EU solutions and sometimes proposed in the payment method, but not with STRIPE payment solutions

(page 2) 46 comments
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[โ€“] exchange12rocks@lemm.ee 7 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Easy: iDEAL (which is a shitty system, but still..)

[โ€“] slazer2au@lemmy.world 5 points 5 days ago (3 children)

Doest that only work in NL?

[โ€“] victorz@lemmy.world 6 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (9 children)

For any purchase made with a credit or debit cards and you give them 2-3% of your money.

I'm not sure I understand this. The stores would be the ones to pay this fee, no? Not you with your money. The price of some item doesn't change depending on whether you use cash or a debit or credit card. Not usually anyway, maybe a small local shop has done this to me once or twice in my life. Or maybe a fair stand or something.

If we wanted to stop giving Mastercard and Visa "our" money, we would have to all band together as a world community and boycott them. ๐Ÿ˜ฌ

Please someone correct me if I'm wrong!

Edit: I mean, yes, of course the price of those small transactions are included in the price of the item. So we are all "paying" Mastercard and Visa money, even those who aren't using them. Which is still to my point that we need to all band together as a world community to boycott them, which seems futile in all honesty.

[โ€“] Dyskolos@lemmy.zip 4 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Technically you're right. The merchant pays the fee. But, those transactional costs are overall calculated into the prices. Like everything else e.g. transportation, packaging, wages, theft, breakage etc. So in the end it's the customer paying those 2-3% even though no price changes if you change payment.

As for the boycott: yes, sure. Voting with your wallet always works. The problem is how deeply they're burrowed into the system globally. The merchant doesn't care, it wants its money in whatever way. But if they don't offer an alternative, you can't boycott it (unless you erase that product from your life or find another merchant). And if you don't boycott it, they don't offer an alternative. Also most people simply don't care at all....

[โ€“] Renohren@lemmy.today 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

How does the store make money to pay those few % points? All consumers pay a percentage of the visa/MasterCard fee. So the prices stay the same in the store no matter the payment method.

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[โ€“] pmtriste@lemmy.world 5 points 5 days ago

Here in Portugal we have MB Way which is handled on a separate network. I understand that it might interoperate with Bancomat (Italy) and Bizum (Spain) also just since November, but I haven't tried yet. Almost everybody in Portugal (except non-integrating expats) seem to use it, though there are spots here and there that refuse for reasons that are unclear to me.

[โ€“] jagermo@feddit.org 5 points 5 days ago

Contact the ECB and demand a digital Euro

[โ€“] Buffalox@lemmy.world 5 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I'd like to know if something works for all of EU. Because that's the only reason for me to have Visa.
Everything in my own country can be handled with "Dankort" our national universally accepted debit card. We also have local Mobile pay which is also pretty universal here.

But those don't work for purchases outside Denmark.

[โ€“] epyon22@programming.dev 5 points 5 days ago (11 children)

What about just old school cash?

[โ€“] Flamekebab@piefed.social 2 points 5 days ago

Sounds like you're working for your car. Simplify, man.

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[โ€“] AlexisFR@jlai.lu 5 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Use the Carte Bancaire network in France,we have that at least.

[โ€“] minilemmy@feddit.org 3 points 5 days ago (2 children)

You mean Carte Bleue? Yes but unfortunately i'm not in France

[โ€“] AlexisFR@jlai.lu 7 points 5 days ago

No, Carte Bleue got bought out by Visa in 2010, I do mean that one : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CB_Bank_Card_Group

[โ€“] Wrongdoer1@lemm.ee 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

Many EU countries have their system but we need to make a European common system. It's been a project from EPI (European payment initiative) and I understand Wero is kind of the first step.

[โ€“] Blaze 5 points 5 days ago
[โ€“] knightly@pawb.social 4 points 5 days ago (8 children)

Just use cash.

I get that it can be a hassle to carry around, but it's the only "real" alternative if you want to keep third party companies from profiling you based on your spending habits and selling that personal info to advertisers.

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[โ€“] Comment105@lemm.ee 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

I don't know, ~~but from a cursory search Revolut looks like a credit/debit card option based in the UK?~~ I'm not personally familiar.

I also thought Re:Member would be an option, but that seems to be Mastercard with a mustache and sunglasses.

[โ€“] jol@discuss.tchncs.de 7 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Revolute is a bank, not a card. They use mastercard.

[โ€“] exchange12rocks@lemm.ee 3 points 5 days ago

And Visa too

[โ€“] Mallspice@lemm.ee 0 points 5 days ago (5 children)

If you donโ€™t need a credit card, donโ€™t get one.

If you have one, cancel it and use a bank card. If you canโ€™t do that, pay off your debts then do that.

A lot of people suck with money because the idea of going into debt, taking loans, and paying interest is normal and sometimes good to them but really Itโ€™s weird and should be avoided for the sake of harmony.

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[โ€“] Eiri@lemmy.ca -1 points 5 days ago (1 children)
[โ€“] minilemmy@feddit.org 7 points 5 days ago (1 children)

my debit card is mastercard...

[โ€“] Eiri@lemmy.ca 4 points 5 days ago

Dang it. I had forgotten that most debit cards now have partnerships like that.

However, remember that debit card transaction fees are typically quite a bit lower (no exact numbers to support my claim, but for instance my hairdresser only takes credit for larger payments; small ones she only accepts debit, or she would just lose too much to the credit card company).

So you wouldn't NOT support MasterCard/Visa, but they WOULD receive less money.

As for non-American credit cards, someone asked a similar question on Reddit and got technically valid but unsatisfying responses.

For instance:

https://www.reddit.com/r/amexcanada/comments/1j31ir0/comment/mfwmz5y/

Like, when they say "don't encourage the US" people don't typically mean jumping to Chinese companies instead. Not to mention UnionPay is definitely not as widely supported as Visa or MasterCard.

And while Japan isn't exactly notorious for its human rights violations these days, I kinda doubt JCB cards would be very widely supported. And could you even get one if you're not Japanese?

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