Saturday, October 23, 2010

Why don’t all stores accept credit cards?

It’s not cheap for small store owners to accept credit cards. Not only do they have to pay set up charges, buy or rent equipment, get a dedicated phone line or other connection for the equipment and often pay monthly fees, they also have significant per transaction fees.
On average a small retail store has to pay somewhere around 20 cents per transaction plus 2% of the transaction amount whenever you pay by credit card. That means when you pay for your meal at the local deli, $0.30 of that $5 goes towards credit card processing fees.
30 cents may not seem like much but it adds up. You also have to consider the full $5 of the sale isn’t a profit to the merchant, in most cases closer to $1 of it is. That’s a 30% decrease in income. So be polite and use cash for your small purchases.

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