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>> No. 30617 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 9:22 pm
30617 American Express
Who the fuck, apart from posing twats, uses one of these that ends up charging the retailer a stupid amount for a 50p can of pop at a corner shop?

I hate the fucking things.
Expand all images.
>> No. 30619 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 10:18 pm
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"But it has so many benefits!"

There were some good, regular customers that were allowed to pay with the fucking things but if you were Joe Random Of The Street then fuck off with that shit. If you're on razor thin margins already and then AmEx comes along and wants to skim 2.5% off the top it becomes really easy to understand why shops hate them.

It's the same scam as credit cards in general. They are the OGs if being middle-man skimmers.
>> No. 30621 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 10:34 pm
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When I worked in a shop you'd always get customers giving it that smug grin as they pulled out their wallet to ask, "Do you take Ammecks?"

We actually did take it as a payment method, but the till system was dodgy and it took longer, so we usually just said no. Of course Mr Amex would get in a huff and ask "Well why not?", and you'd just shrug, because why would a lowly till slave even know that. But what I always really wanted to say was "Why are you shopping somewhere that doesn't?"

I always figured that would boil their piss for the rest of the day, because it spoils the fantasy that you're a rich wanker, and forces you to confront that you were buying the cheapest aerial connector in fucking Maplins.
>> No. 30623 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 10:50 pm
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>>30621
Maplins.

May Loki rest its sale of overpriced mid-end connectors and peripherals soul.
>> No. 30624 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 10:58 pm
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>>30617
Showing off over any kind of credit/payment card is quite fucking ridiculous when you think of it.

I had an Amex card about twenty years ago - the only feature I noticed that was even slightly good was their customer service. I once lost my card, and was able to pick one up (!) same day from one of their offices in London.

I believe they offer credit cards now, but the cachet they used to have was that it was a charge card, you had to pay off the balance entirely every month. Still not sure of the point of showing off about that.
>> No. 30626 Anonymous
7th August 2020
Friday 11:51 pm
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This isn't related to the thread, but come to think about it, how in fuck's name did card payments work before the internet? Seems like there's a hell of a lot of administrative work behind it all, involving keeping receipts of every transaction and somehow reporting them to the card operator etc.

I'm guessing that's why once upon a time, shit like American Express or Diners Club etc actually mattered, at least, would I be right?

In fact christ, how did banks even work before money was just pretend computer numbers? I'm guessing you were restricted to your local bank branch, because they're the ones who would have your actual account records in a filing cabinet, rather than there being a giant master list on a server somewhere.

It sounds daft but I really do marvel at the way pre-digital society actually functioned. I'm starting to think computers are where it all went wrong, actually.
>> No. 30627 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 12:06 am
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>>30626
>how did banks even work before money was just pretend computer numbers

That's a fucking long time ago though - Banks were definitely the first industry to use computers wholesale, particularly investment banking. That said, it's only just over 20 years ago that trading became properly electronic, and many/most banks and trading exchanges were using paper tickets to track trades.

For consumers, it's not so long ago that everyone was using cheques for payment - that really was a whole antique, three-day process of sending bits of paper around the system; you're right, the cheques were sent to your local branch, and it was quite difficult to bank at a different branch.

It's worth reading about Tally Sticks too - it's the origin of the word "stock".

Nice article here about them
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-40189959

And the Bank of England has a very nice page on their history
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/museum/whats-on/2019/325-years-exhibition/payments-through-time
>> No. 30628 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 12:12 am
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>>30626
A quick google led me to find the question raised:

>How did credit card machines back in the 1980’s verify if a credit card had funds?

The answer is mostly relevant:

SHORT ANSWER: They didn’t.

LONG ANSWER: The process was very different

A clerk would check the CC number against the Yellow Sheet of lost/stolen cards. If the card wasn’t listed (Yellow Sheets were updated weekly) he/she could go ahead.
If the sale was for more than $30-$50, the clerk would call Visa or MC to get a phone authorization. The card companies would Okay the amount. That authorization would be written in longhand directly on the three-part credit card slip.
The card would go on the swiper (actually an “embosser” I think, it’s been a while) and they would pull hard on the roller handle to imprint the card onto the form.
The customer would then sign the paper form which was interleaved with (gasp) carbon paper so that the signature and credit card details would be in triplicate.
The clerk would compare the signature with the one on the card.
The clerk would then tear off the binding strip that held the three copies together. The clerk would give one copy to the customer, one would remain with the merchant, the last would be sent to the card company. Interestingly enough, the interleaved carbon paper did not tear away from the backing strip.
That last bit caused A BIG ISSUE. Back then, card thieves were not hackers as much as they were dumpster-divers.

A quick dive into any shopping malls dumpsters would yield copies of hundreds of credit cards, complete with signatures, on carbon paper.
>> No. 30632 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 1:59 am
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>>30626
Debit cards have only been around for about 30 years. In the analogue days, you'd hand over your credit card, if the transaction was above the "floor limit" they'd call the card issuer for authorisation, then use an imprinting machine to complete a slip with your card details and their details to send to their bank.
>> No. 30639 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 11:47 am
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When I worked at maplins once, back when Amex was the only card where you still had to check the signature, I accidentally got one guys card blocked because I wasn't used to doing them and hit the "signature doesn't match" button by mistake.
>> No. 30640 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 1:17 pm
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>>30639
Good. The tosser.
>> No. 30642 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 3:57 pm
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I got an American Express because I was 20 and it came with a Costco membership and was way better than any other credit card I could get.

Now, I only use it for fuel and big chain shops, and pay it all off. I wouldn't dream of using it at a small business, plus, it's just a faff if I'm not sure they take it. I don't give a shit about Tesco losing 50p on a £3 meal deal though.
>> No. 30643 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 5:01 pm
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>>30628
>shopping mall
>dumpster

Standards are slipping everywhere.
>> No. 30644 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 8:24 pm
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>>30632
Christ, I'm actually old enough to have used one of those machines.

>>30643

To be fair the term "dumpster diving" was fairly universal across all anglophone countries even back in the 70s/80s. No excuse for "shopping mall", though.
>> No. 30645 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 8:51 pm
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>>30644
>>30643
Prices are given in dollars - seems to be a blatant copy-paste from an American source to me.
>> No. 30646 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 8:53 pm
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>>30645
Also "clerk" rather than "cashier", "authorization", etc.
>> No. 30647 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 8:59 pm
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>>30645
That's probably why he prefaced it with "A quick google..."
>> No. 30648 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 8:59 pm
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>>30644
>Christ, I'm actually old enough to have used one of those machines.

I had to use one in a Little Chef about six or seven years ago.
>> No. 30649 Anonymous
8th August 2020
Saturday 9:01 pm
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>>30647
Yes, but the otherlad(s) were complaining about the Americanisms.
>> No. 32474 Anonymous
17th October 2021
Sunday 3:38 am
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I've got a Nectar Card one, at the time they were offering 20,000 points if you spent a certain amount within 6 months.

I've linked it to Paypal, Amazon, Ebay et al so it's easy to rack up points during the course of the month, and paying it off is a piece of piss, so I've never been charged interest for anything.
>> No. 32475 Anonymous
18th October 2021
Monday 5:39 am
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I pay for everything on Amex becsuse I get 0.5% cashback on it all. Sorry.

As of last week though I don't because now I get 1% on my Chase debit card.
>> No. 32476 Anonymous
18th October 2021
Monday 9:06 am
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>>30648 The bloke selling frozen fish out of a van still has one. Or did 3 years ago.
Mid 90s, I pointed out to a checkout lass that she should probably be putting the card in the machine before dragging the roller over. She looked, and had a morning's worth of blank but signed slips.
>> No. 32477 Anonymous
18th October 2021
Monday 3:02 pm
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>>32476
>She looked, and had a morning's worth of blank but signed slips.

Actually cringing at the thought.
>> No. 32581 Anonymous
21st November 2021
Sunday 12:06 am
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Dunno whether other card companies do this or how many loopholes they try to exploit but Amex promises to insure purchases against accidental damage and theft for 90 days. People who think credit cards generally are predatory, wise to avoid or in fact have any negative monetary cost whatsoever are dumb as bricks (or are just making lame excuses for their own lack of self control).

In other financial news I learned this week but slightly too late to be of use personally, the government will give assorted dolescum £1200 over four years if only they can rub two pennies together. The scheme's called Help to Save.
>> No. 32582 Anonymous
21st November 2021
Sunday 12:32 am
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>>32581

Can I, an ordinary working class person with adequate personal finances, take advantage of this in the same way companies that still had their employees working took advantage of the furlough scheme?

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