Kroger bans Visa cards

[Amethyst]

Essentially, Kroger doesn't want to pay Visa's swipe fees.

We earn a nice bit of change from Visa and Master Card rebates and other incentives. Still, I've been wondering how much the various credit card incentive/rebate programs have pushed up bank charges to merchants, and whether a pushback by merchants could eventually cause banks to scrap rebates.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money...ard/881228002/

[omni550]

I see that this is currently limited to a few dozen stores in California. Perhaps it's a pilot?

I'd hate for this to roll-out nationally as Kroger is 1/2 mile away and I ALWAYS pay with my Visa card.

I noticed that at 'my' Kroger they recently started a program where you can scan and bag your own groceries with a hand-held scanner so you don't need to go through a check-out line. They've even incentivized this -- I think you get something like a $5 discount the first time you try it on a purchase of $35 or more. This may also be a pilot.

Looks like they are looking to cut costs, big time.

omni

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amethyst Essentially, Kroger doesn't want to pay Visa's swipe fees. We earn a nice bit of change from Visa and Master Card rebates and other incentives. Still, I've been wondering how much the various credit card incentive/rebate programs have pushed up bank charges to merchants, and whether a pushback by merchants could eventually cause banks to scrap rebates. https://www.usatoday.com/story/money...ard/881228002/

Wow! Well I use my American Express Blue at Kroger anyway. 6% back on groceries.

[athena53]

Interesting- they'll have to pick their battles. I was unhappy to find that my nice new American Airlines MC wasn't accepted by the business doing work on my house- that charge would have made up half the $3K I had to spend to get the 60,000-mile signing bonus. I gave them my trusty Fidelity 2% cashback Visa. I've also run into businesses, mostly smaller ones, that don't take American Express due to high swipe fees.

If I were a retailer I'd have to choose only one out of the Big 3 to ban.

[Amethyst]

While most of the contractors who work on or around our house accept CC's, they all charge 3% or 4% extra for doing so. Otherwise we really would have raked in the rebates. Same with property taxes - we could use a CC to pay, but the fee would add more than $300.00 to the yearly charge.

Quote:

Originally Posted by athena53 I was unhappy to find that my nice new American Airlines MC wasn't accepted by the business doing work on my house- that charge would have made up half the $3K I had to spend to get the 60,000-mile signing bonus. I gave them my trusty Fidelity 2% cashback Visa. .

[GalaxyBoy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 Wow! Well I use my American Express Blue at Kroger anyway. 6% back on groceries.

+1. I wish Kroger would take NFC payments like Apple Pay, but it appears they have been resisting that.

Our local Kroger has rolled out the self-scan and at the same time eliminated the express lanes in favor of additional self check out lanes. I find the hand scanners to be too time consuming, and the self check gives me (and others around me) too many errors where it locks up until the attendant comes over to reset it. Now they're re-arranging the entire store again.

Sorry, this is turning into the Pet Peeve of the Day thread.

[FIREd_2015]

WinCo is another grocery store that doesn't accept credit cards.

[candrew]

Quote:

Originally Posted by omni550 I noticed that at 'my' Kroger they recently started a program where you can scan and bag your own groceries with a hand-held scanner so you don't need to go through a check-out line. Looks like they are looking to cut costs, big time. omni

Next they'll want customers to stock the shelves, round-up stray carts in the parking lot and mop the floors, too.

[Chuckanut]

Quote:

Originally Posted by candrew Next they'll want customers to stock the shelves, round-up stray carts in the parking lot and mop the floors, too.

We have to bring our own bags (a city law), bag the groceries ourselves and then polish the shoes of the Welcome Gal on the way out. But, I get bonus points to use on all sorts of industrial processed junk food I no longer eat.

[Lakedog]

Quote:

Originally Posted by omni550 I see that this is currently limited to a few dozen stores in California. Perhaps it's a pilot?

Guess USAToday is going for headlines as this appears to involve only 21 stores owned by Kroger in CA branded as Food Co. No Kroger branded stores at all, at least yet, so maybe they are doing a test run on a smaller footprint?

[Brat]

If they ban Visa I will shop elsewhere.

[HadEnuff]

there needs to be, and IMO will be, some sort of push back from the merchants. When I ran my dental practice, and we started taking credit card payments, the swipe fee was relatively small, and consistent, and worth the money it cost us in order to be paid at the moment.

By the time I retired the swipe fees were all over the place, and they were at the point where I was about to stop accepting them. I am sure this is the price, being paid by the merchants, for the marketing game played by the CC companies of offering bigger and bigger rewards for using their particular card.
At some point, something has to give, and I suspect that what Kroger is doing is the start of a trend.

[FIREmenow]

They are closing a whole bunch of stores here in NC. I think they're in trouble.

[mpeirce]

Quote:

Originally Posted by GalaxyBoy +1. I wish Kroger would take NFC payments like Apple Pay, but it appears they have been resisting that.

It's odd to me. One of the benefits of self-scan for Kroger is that it speeds people through their checkouts. Apple Pay also speeds people through checkouts.

Eventually they'll get around to it. One reason my DW favors Meijer over Kroger is that Meijer takes Apple Pay. So does Aldi for that matter. Though really the only thing I buy there is their 85% cocoa chocolate bars.

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mpeirce It's odd to me. One of the benefits of self-scan for Kroger is that it speeds people through their checkouts. Apple Pay also speeds people through checkouts. Eventually they'll get around to it. One reason my DW favors Meijer over Kroger is that Meijer takes Apple Pay. So does Aldo for that matter. Though really the only thing I buy there is their 85% cocoa chocolate bars.

Definitely the fastest checkout I experience is with Apple Pay - way faster than anything else. But for me for groceries, Sprouts is the only place accepting it.

BTW - all these chip credit cards now don't require signature, but stores still ask for signatures. I know, I know, they have to update their terminal software......

[travelover]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FIREd_2015 WinCo is another grocery store that doesn't accept credit cards.

Actually most grocery stores did not used to accept credit cards. Winco is all about low prices, so it is logical to me that they avoid the extra expense of credit card fees.

[Jerry1]

A local True Value store charged me a fee to use my credit card. It was about a $20 charge and the fee was about $1.50. The biggest issue I have is there was nothing to let me know about this charge before I paid. Even then, I didn’t notice it. Of course had it been a bigger purchase, I would have noticed. Point is, no warning. Guess what hardware I no longer patronize.

[braumeister]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jerry1 A local True Value store charged me a fee to use my credit card. It was about a $20 charge and the fee was about $1.50. The biggest issue I have is there was nothing to let me know about this charge before I paid. Even then, I didn’t notice it. Of course had it been a bigger purchase, I would have noticed. Point is, no warning. Guess what hardware I no longer patronize.

I believe that’s a violation of their merchant agreement with Visa.

[explanade]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 Wow! Well I use my American Express Blue at Kroger anyway. 6% back on groceries.

I get only 3% on my Amex Blue Cash but no annual fee.

For that extra 3% to be worth the $95 annual fee, you would need to spend over $3,166.

Also use Chase Freedom, which will always have one quarter during the year of offering 5x points, redeemable towards cash or transferring to airlines if you have a premium Chase card.


I've never shopped Krogers. But Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, Safeways and Lucky supermarkets all have NFC or Apple Pay in the Bay Area.

[Teacher Terry]

Winco is so much cheaper that I am fine with them not taking CC’s.