Credit cards not accepted at many stores

Hi �“ I’m a newbie to this forum and just as new to Germany. As such, I would really appreciate someone explaining to me why my Visa Debit Cards are not accepted at 99.9% of vending establishments here and why the “EC� payment method is the only one that seems to carry any weight. I was stunned to have my card turned away at the Main Railway Station, where I am sure there are many foreign tourists flowing through on a daily basis. Surely not all them carry EC Cards or the appropriate amount of cash?

Is there a solution to this problem? Making sure I have cash on me for every eventuality is a thing of the past, as far as I am concerned, and I’d rather not be forced into a regressive phase, if I can help it.

Credit card acceptance is very low in Germany because Germans don't like getting into debt. Only one in seven Germans even owns a credit card, and most that do must pay their bill in full each month. Since virtually every single German in the country owns an EC card, which works in the same way as a Visa Debit Card, it's not really worth the effort of very many establishments to pay the fees incurred in order to accept credit cards. I agree that somewhere like an international train station probably should be a bit more open to international forms of payment, but I guess they just don't want to pay the extra fees. Even places like IKEA or Saturn generally don't take credit cards.

The solution, I'm afraid, is indeed to start carrying more cash around with you. That's what the Germans do (I've seen plenty of Germans with hundreds of euros in their wallets), and when in Rome...

The credit card debate is often discussed on these pages. My personal view is that I think it's great that people here only buy what they can afford, and since virtually all Germans own an EC card, the only people who are inconvenienced are a relatively tiny number of tourists. Most touristy places do accept credit cards.

Captain Henry...

Welcome to Germany.

PS: What STB said. It will change and there are various reasons why Mastercard in particular could well overtake EC as the card of choice. There was some discussion about this on some other thread at some other time I seem to recall.

bit of an exaggeration. Visa debit should work every where you can use Visa credit cards and I use mine all over Munich. EC cards are the German brand of Maestro Card, run by MasterCard. I think the US version is Cirrus, so if you have one of those, you should be ok. I have had lots of problems using my German EC card in Britain, though, despite the shops and banks accepting Maestro cards.

Yes but unfortunately they aren't the same as UK switch/visa debit cards because you can't use them on most websites. Yes lots of german sites let you do an ueberweisung but the standard EC card doesn't have the 16 digit number you need for online payments. rant over.

they should be. Switch has been re-branded Maestro. EC card is also Maetrso. Check out the website.

This drives me INSANE. I love plastic. I hate cash, and after 15 months of living here, I STILL hate cash. I love my visa card, and I love my EC card, and if I go somewhere that doesn't take either, I go crazy. I can't just say 'when in Rome' when it comes to carrying cash. I'm uncomfortable with it. I don't like to have more than 40 Euros in my wallet at any given time. I have never been robbed, but I come from a place where cash is completely unnecessary and being a banker's daughter, I had a debit card since I was 10.
I have this problem where in some places my EC card doesn't work because it only works with a PIN system. In some places such as KaDeWe it's ok because they accept visa, but others it is not, and I feel angry because shouldn't they all take PIN cards? I'd love to eliminate cash permanantly from my life once again.

But my uk maestro card has 16 numbers and a 3 number code on the back whereas my sparkasse EC card has 10 numbers, no security code and is basically like a cheque guarantee card of days of yore. And yes I get the whole "computer says no" thing if I try and use my maestro card here. The german EC card seems to work fine in UK shops, my gripe is just that you can't use it online.

An EC card has a PIN number, why doesn't yours work? I use my EC card for most purchases and carry very little cash around. I use a credit card for online purchases and am quite happy to have it paid off at the end of the month, running up credit card debts is a mugs game, the interest rates are far too high.

that was actually my point. It SHOULD work fine. It doesn't all the time. I have tried using it in banks and stores where they advertise that you can use a maestro card but my German EC-card didn't work.

Actually, the main reason why stores do not accept credit cards is because they are not willing to pay the fee charged for each transaction. Who gives a toss if they could be offering you some kind of service? Nope. If you want to spend hundreds of Euros on electronics in Media Markt then make sure you have the cash in your bank account cos it is coming out of there sharpish. You may want the convenience of buying now and paying later, but the shops don;t want you to have that convenience. Who wants them to offer you a service anyway?

Dammit - I wish someone had not started this thread again. There is another where I rant and rave on the subject.

Personally it doesn't bother me. I just carry more cash than normal, and use the EC card when necessary. Plus as I hate shopping so it is not an issue.

However...

It winds me right up as I run an online business. So just to clarify:


I can officially confirm that a German MAESTRO is not the same as a UK MAESTRO. It is a joke. No 3 figure number on the back of the card so CANNOT be used
online like a Maestro. Obviously if the site you are using supports LASTSCHRIFT that is an option (but Germany only).


This is a crap excuse. The fees are very low, and when you take credit cards you get increased turnover. The problem is totally chicken and egg. Punters don't
have cards, so shops don't take cards - and it just goes on and on.

I would be happy from a retailer view - if they just sorted it so that a GERMAN MAESTRO worked like a UK version for online purchases.

So when running an online business in Germany you therefore need to offer:

Credit Cards
Lastschriftverfahren
Zahlung gegen Vorkasse
PayPal
Nachname

p.s. Credit Cards are maybe 1 in 8 orders.

Plus if selling clothing then you really need to offer the option (like the big guys) to send goods with an invoice, but there is no way I am doing that.

This also adds hugely to the admin side of things. I pay staff just to monitor and control our German payments, and then my bookeeper bill for last month was
around €800 just to match up the payments.

It's like the dark ages!

Edit: Looking on the bright side! It makes it a bugger for any foreign companies to enter the market here, and keeps competition down.

The credit card companies do take the piss with their fees. Now the capitalist world is hooked on their services they can, and do, charge what they want to the shops with no apparent competition between the different providers. In a way it's refreshing that German business has said a collective 'bollocks to that', which works here because German consumers are used to the 'service' they get here. Many shops will take credit card, but strongly prefer not to - Sauter will take Visa/Mastercard but like you to max your EC card out first, so they pay fees on the smallest amount. I don't have a problem with this because, forgive me for sounding self righteous or perhaps just a bit old fashioned, if I want to buy something expensive I save up for it first.

Amusingly in England a year or so back there was some excitement because the British unsecured debt total had gone past some big landmark number and several economists were saying it was no problem. Now there's an ever increasing count of articles about the rising cases of insolvency, with some people noting that in the past credit card applications were frequently declined whereas now it seems the banks have figured out that they only make money when they give out credit, and almost throw credit at their customers. Many can't deal with the 'paying back what I owe' part of the deal, or figure out that 24% apr is a lot, then they fail to make their payments the bank trashes their credit rating so they can't get a loan at a lower rate.

Edit: Just seen JE's post - whether the % charged by the credit card companies is significant or not is a matter of personal opinion, and I must admit I have no direct experience but many do complain. Few % or not, it's either money the shopkeeper has or the credit card company has.

Great. Just what we need in this thread. A leftie anti-capitalist.


So you bought your property for cash huh? Well done. Glad you did not pay those evil banks any mortgage money.

Oh God. Another one of those "Why isn't Germany exactly the same as (insert name of home country here)?" threads.

It isn't and it doesn't have to be. Get a bank account here in Germany and they'll provide you with a CC and an EC card. There is usually a minimum limit for accepting payment by EC card (typically €5). Apart from this, In 9 years I never had an EC card refused. I use my CC if I am travelling or buying fuel for my car and sometimes for payments over the internet, otherwise I'll pay by direct debit from my account or use an Überweisung. It isn't that difficult once you accept that each country has it's foibles and you decide to go with the flow instead of trying to fight it.

So JE you run a business and you don't know the difference between secured and unsecured debt? Good luck to you sir.

First time I've been called a leftie, but that just speaks to your ability to read a string of words and accurately extract the meaning.

You paid for your house with a credit card?

What kind of an answer (or a question rather...) is that?

i went grocery shopping at the family-run Edeka next door and they only take cash! lucky for me i had a 50€ in my pocket, but now i remember why i rather go to the Plus or Aldi down the street. at least they take the EC card. this shop is also a favorite shop for grannies. i guess they'd have problems with any card.

Oh God. Another one of those "I prefer to stay blinkered and accept everything just as it is here in Germany" threads.

It's like this. It is NOT a perfect world. Some things are better in the UK, some things are better in Germany. I don't see the problem with trying to have the best of everything in the one place?

Personally I don't have an issue on the retail side of things over here. It works OK. It is perhaps a little dangerous that you need to carry so much cash around, but then again the crime rate is very low.

I just have the hump that it holds back internet retailers. That is my only 100% self-centered gripe.

It's a well known fact that Germany's electronic payment system is still in the paleolithic age. Since not having a credit card apparently makes some kind of a major socio-economic statement, I would like someone to please find statistics which compare personal debt in Germany with other European countries to actually prove the point they are trying to make.

Just for the record I do think that unsecured debt levels are often reckless in the UK, and the way they are peddled is often inappropriate. But I am a free-market supporter so it is up to the individual to make a choice.

The UK market is very open and competitive. This is why they have such low mortgage rates (relative to the base rate), although ironically this in itself may not be a good thing as it just has the effect perhaps of driving up house prices.

In the UK they have also changed the law so that a bankrupt is discharged in 12 months. This in theory should force the banks to be a little more careful, but may just have the effect of driving up debt rates for the masses (as insurance).

So overally I think if you start to meddle with the system you can get in a worse mess. Better just to let the market find its way. In this case in Germany credit cards are NOT yet catching on. But like McDonalds and Toyotas - they are on their way people - just a matter of time.

HA, you didn't make that differentiation in your post. You clearly stated you never went into debt to buy something, you saved first. You didn't say anything about making an exception for secured debt.

OP, this drives me nuts as well and I've been living here on and off for the last 8 years. Even had a fight at the weekend with my gf over this. Just needed to pick up something small in the supermarket at the weekend but it was less than €10 and neither of us had the cash and they wouldn't accept the EC card. I went off into a rant at the time... just drives me f***kin crazy at times that you always have to have cash on you. And then you have to find the right geldautomat or you get charged €4, what a joke. Bloody difficult to find the right one when you are stuck for €10! At home I can use any banks ATM and don't get charged any fee. No idea what the hell that €4 is, thought all this handling was done automatically! And credit cards... they shouldn't be even allowed to be called that as they are not proper credit cards anyway. Plus mine will be pretty much useless when I travel home as Ireland will no longer accept credit cards without a Chip and Pin from March... so I'll be stuck with getting ridiculous fees for taking out my money when I'm at home... agggghhhh ... Sorry, end of Monday morning rant

@jester
I feel your pain.

Clearly we have missed some major crucial point Jules? Apparently:

SECURED DEBT - Good thing, no problem, let's all kiss and make daisy chains.

UNSECURED DEBT - Bad doggie, work of the devil, capitalist plot, go straight to jail do not collect £200 pounds.

Happily.


UK debt 'double Europe average'


Credit action

Well, OG it would be nice to be in a position to buy property for cash, but obviously this is unrealistic in all practical cases, impossible in the UK (as house price inflation vastly exceeds any savings return), but I once went to a German financial advisor who came up with a scheme where this could be possible in Germany (I didn't trust that...). Naturally, the advantage of saving before buying is then the interest works in your favour, instead of against you, although German savings rates are pitiful, and rants on that subject are the subject of another thread...

My German credit card gives me the choice of paying it off at the end of the month or just paying a certain percentage, which I declined as I have no interest in paying their excessive interest payments. The chip and pin thing is a valid point, but if you get the right bank here they have arrangements with foreign banks that enable you to get cash on your EC card without paying any fees.

I raise you with this one:


So if we are worth more money, why the bugger should we not borrow more than the Portugese and the Greeks?

@Small Town Boy
This is not a UK versus Germany problem. Germany is uniquely retarded in this respect. Go to Holland, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain, etc.. - and these are countries where I have firsthand experience - and you will find that electronic payment systems are far more advanced. As I said, compare personal debt in Germany with other European countries, not just Britain. In fact, if your article is anything to go by, it would prove that this no credit card=no debt business is hogwash...

Now we just need repayment rates, credit-card penetration rates et al, and we can really party in this thread!

I've the same thing with my credit card but I don't bother. It's not flexible at all. At least with my Irish credit card I could pay off whatever I wanted whenever I wanted plus I could add cash to it. This was great as there were no fees then when taking out cash in any country once you had a positive balance.
How does the cash on EC card work, I would be very interested in that as I get charged silly fees once outside Germany. I'm with Postbank, so maybe they don't do this.

just because a computer processes the transaction , it doesn't mean it doesn't cost the bank anything.

They're low precisely because consumer borrowing is low. UK banks need to offer high interest rates to secure the funds to lend to the type of person who buys things they can't afford and don't really need.


Surely if the British have more money then they don't need to borrow as much? Although my experience is that Germans have more disposal income - either that or the British are simply better at disposing of their income.

They have a rather sexy new payment system started in Norway:

https://www.luup.com/home/user/gb.aspx

You pay via SMS on your mobile phone. The mobile phone has credit. Actually they do have it live in the UK and Germany as well as you can see on their
website.

Answers on a postcard as to when this one will get taken up over here?

True, but presumably it cost something all along whereas the charge to client is fairly recent.

If you have your assets tied up in property or pension funds youi can't exactly use it to pay for your new Armani suit, now can you? Which is why people who want both borrow money they don't have (because they are paying a mortgage and penion fund etc) to buy the suit.

I'm with Deutsche Bank and I can get money from Barclays in the UK for nothing, plus many other countries including the States, Bank of America I think, although not all countries in Europe are covered. I can also get cash from Postbank ATMs without cost , there's some sort of tie up between various German banks, so maybe you should check that you haven't been getting your cash from the wrong bank abroad.

not in Germany it isn't. They have always charged non-customers for withdrawels. The costs of running ATMs is, in part, recovered by the monthly fee some banks charge for holding your account. Non-customers don't pay this, so are charged.

Utter Bollocks. The rates between Sterling and €uro are different because the bank base rates are different. Euro base rate is 2.5% I think at the moment, and the UK base rate is 5.25%.

Rates are set by Bank of England and the European Central Bank chaps.

Irrelevant; a bank can charge whatever it chooses on its credit and debit accounts. Some "savings" accounts pay 0.25%, others 5.3%.


A German would forget about an Armani suit and go to C&As...

Don't be soft. The base rates set the market level. Banks can dick around with special offers, loss leaders and shitty deals - but ultimately you will find
that the TRUE rates will reflect the base rates. Banks also pay market rates for their lending and borrowing.

You can get 10% in the UK - but only on tiny amounts, fixed for 12 months, when the wind is blowing the right away etc.

If your getting a savings rate for a normal lump of cash it will be around 2.5% here and 5% in the UK. That is due to the base rates for Sterling and Euros. It is not because UK banks are more generous and all that crap.

JE, 100% correct that banks' interest rates are set off the base rate but how is the base rate set? Number of factors, obviously, including inflation, exchange rates etc., but one factor is also saving rates and debt, is it not?

Since Labour has been in power they handed the reins over to the BANK OF ENGLAND to set UK Sterling base rates. They have a monthly meeting to discuss, and a vote. This gets economists all excited.

As you will see from the recent unexpected rate rise of 0.25% they are primarily concerned about INFLATION control and the state of the economy. The are not directly interested in the rate of your personal savings or personal borrowings. But of course all things are related. There are always plus and minus sides to the base rate.

Here in Euroland the rates are also set centrally. This is not proving to be a great game, as in Ireland they could do with higher rates to slow the economy, and here in Germany we need lower rates to help business. But with 1 currency you gotta have 1 rate. So they try and set a mid-level that is OKish for all the Euro economies.

Base rate of course will also affect the value of your currency, and then also the cost of imports and exports. So frankly the rates paid to Herman the German for his €500 savings account is the least of their concerns.

Actually my ING Direct account has just gone up to 3% from 1st January.

of course they are related. Inflation is influenced by money supply. The savings rate will reduce money supply, so these are usually stats that are taken into consideration.

There are smarter guys than us debating these things. But normally to reduce inflation (as now) they increase the base rate. This should have the effect of decreasing consumer borrowing, and will also suck out spare consumer cash - 'cos the cost of the mortgage also goes up, so the consumers buy less plasma tellies etc.

Personally I don't think the UK economy will be affected much by this increased rate encouraging people to save more! But it doesn't matter if I am right or wrong - because any effect works in the same desired direction - it will lower inflation.

You will also notice that ever singe one of them even German companies (Media Markt etc) accept CCs its only in Germany that they don't. The German EC system is actually two systems. EC and Maestro. EC is as it stands for Electronic Cash and requires a PIN code and the money is taken direct from your account. Maestro is the old fashion system requiring a signature and requires a week or so before it comes out of your account. If you sign and don't have the money in the account it stays on stand by untill there is enough. I had that happen once when I bought a sweater from C&A didn't have enough cash (few days before payday) and so it never came out. I never got a letter but a few months latter they took the cash out of my account. An other time we paid for a pair of running shoes at Intersport with a German M/C and the system approved the purchase but never printed the second half of the receipt (I signed for it) latter they refused to honour the payment and we got an irate call from the owner, so I just transferred the money to their account. As well when we first arrived our first EC card was Maestro only and I only found out after it had been declined serval times and I asked at the bank and they had to issue a new card.

Where Germany is better than most places are the fee's charged. In Canada it's $35 (20 euros) for an NSF payment in Germany the bank doesn't charge you anything for NSF payments and perhaps 2-4 euros from the other end (credit card what ever)

It drives me nuts to not be able to use a credit card at more shops/businesses in this part of the world. There are credit cards out there that give you rewards such as frequent flier miles. I am not suggesting that people should buy things they can't afford (even though I think it is an individual's responsibility to be responsible- we do not need the shops to be our nannies!)-- but if I am going to go pick up groceries, purchase a new sweater, go on a train trip, or buy a piece of furniture or something it would be nice to reap the benefits that I could get if I was able to use my card.

Here's some brilliance-- Eddie Bauer in Germany (clothing chain.) I have gone into their stores in Munich and payed for things with an Austrian-issued MasterCard, no problem. However they do not have everything in their stores-- some of their products are catalog only. They would not accept a non-German credit card (or bankomat/EC, nor bank transfer) for a catalog order. And it should not have had anything to do with different rates of taxation in Austria and Germany, nor different currency (both use the euro) because I wanted to order something from their German business and get it shipped to a family member in Germany.

I personally would rather pay with plastic, not only because I can get some benefits from my card, but because if my wallet gets lost or stolen I can call the card company and get the card cancelled. If my wallet goes missing with 200 euros I am out of the money and no way to prove that I had the money.