Ken Brown wrote: > Er, I hit "send" prematurely, and I meant to go on to say that I have > often used 1 or 200 UKP in folding money - it is easy to do with > universal availability of ATMs. If anything I use more cash than I did > 15 years ago because it is so simple to get hold of. And saves the > bother of waiting while they go online to validate the credit card if > the latest series of Buffy on video exceeds the floor limit at the shop.
Yes, that is because Bob's comments were originally biased to the American market. There, in the US (I don't know about Canada), compared to Europe and most other countries, the usage of the credit card is much higher, and ATMs are less used. The reason for this is the structure of the banking industry. In most countries, there are 3-4 huge national banks that dominate. Consequently, they drive banking, and they have powerful ATM networks that are national in scope. Also, they drive card usage more, and thus they don't advance the cause of the credit card any more than it suits them. In contrast, the US is one of the few countries with little "national" banking. There are something like 10,000 banks there, and there no "national" banks. Consequently, the glue that holds the system together is the credit card majors (amongst other things like the fed), and they drive much of the utilisation patterns. The US therefore has weaker ATM networks (compared with other countries). Whilst a lot of that ground has been caught up, it is the case that the CC majors own the two big networks (as Bob says). > > I use a debit card, one that draws against my bank current account the > > way a cheque does (probably "check" to you). It's the same card that is > > used as a cheque card. Lots of purchases over $100. I've bought a > > miniature video camera with it, maybe 1500 dollars US. Debit cards I think are relatively new development in the US, as they bypass the CC companies' interests. They have been strong in the rest of the world for a longer time. For that reason, there is a whole host of charges as they go through the different institutions, including the CC networks, which you won't find so strong elsewhere. > > Still involves merchant charges of course. As far as they are concerned > > it is no different from a credit card. The cashier at the till probably > > doesn't even know the difference (after all it says "Visa" on it). (PS: I could be wrong about the details above, I haven't checked any of them, but I think I have the big picture down.) -- iang
