
Pass the Payment Choice Act - DiabloD3
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/09/pass-payment-choice-act
======
IdoRA
It is important to consider that cash is not “free” to accept and handle
(consider the needs for safe storage and depositing, as well as losses due to
skimming and other forms of theft). The overhead in handling cash, for some
business sectors, greatly exceeds the transaction costs associated with credit
and debit cards. An option that preserves privacy but doesn’t have the
overhead of cash is needed.

~~~
tzs
> An option that preserves privacy but doesn’t have the overhead of cash is
> needed.

How about this?

1\. Only require certain businesses to accept cash. Make sure this includes
some classes of business that most people have fairly reasonable access to.
Grocery stores and convenience stores, for example.

2\. Require those business to sell prepaid debit cards for cash. The debit
cards must have no extra fees for purchase. A $20 debit card for example would
cost $20 cash. No ID is required to buy these cards.

3\. The debit cards would be subject to the normal processing fees upon use.

4\. Other business can choose to not accept cash, but they must access the
prepaid debit cards, and cannot charge any fees for them that they do not
charge for other non-cash payment methods.

~~~
mindslight
Prepaid debit cards are straight out as they all require people to assent to a
lengthy contract simply to use them, promulgated by the same companies
dragging their feet on privacy preserving digital payments (20+ year old
technology at this point). Until we get widespread private payments that are
accessible to all without appeasing banks, preserving the basic option of cash
is important.

~~~
tzs
That's for reloadable cards. You can by a preloaded non-reloadable card
anonymously for cash and use them without signing any contract.

~~~
mindslight
Without physically signing anything, yes. But non-reloadable cards still come
with a long nastygram purporting to give away your rights to privacy,
recourse, etc. Who knows how many of the terms would hold up in court, but by
the time you're there you've already lost.

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twoodfin
Having now read the bill[1], I’m interested in the legal theory that would
make it Constitutional. It’s not limited to interstate transactions (would
defeat the point) or retail establishments engaged in interstate banking
through their payment processors.

What authority does Congress have to regulate whether a retailer in Wisconsin
has to accept cash rather than only checks from local banks?

[1] [https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-
bill/2650...](https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-
bill/2650/text)

~~~
mindslight
IMO this seems like more of a clarification of existing law than actually new
law. The only ambiguity has been "legal tender for _all debts_ ", where the
businesses' argument is that they can revoke an offer based on how someone
intends to pay. As things currently stand, one would be in the right to go
into a "cashless" store, consume an item that was for sale, say you forgot
your credit card, and offer to settle up in cash.

~~~
tzs
> As things currently stand, one would be in the right to go into a "cashless"
> store, consume an item that was for sale, say you forgot your credit card,
> and offer to settle up in cash.

First you would have to successfully argue that there is a debt. The store
might argue that you stole the item you consumed.

It all depends on how you fit what happens in a store to the offer/acceptable
view of contracts.

Is it:

1\. by putting the item on the shelf with a price tag, the store is making an
offer to sell it at that price, and

2\. by picking it up you have accepted the offer, forming a contract and now
you owe the store for the item?

Or is it:

1\. when you bring the item to the cashier you are making an offer to buy the
item at the marked price, and

2\. when the cashier rings you up the store accepts your offer?

Even if putting an item on a shelf with a price tag is an offer, rather than
an invitation to treat, I believe I've seen at least one case that said that
picking up the item isn't enough to accept--the offer is accepted and the
contract formed when you actually pay. So even then consuming the item before
paying would be theft.

~~~
mindslight
I don't see the argument how putting an item on a shelf with a price tag is
_not_ an offer, but IANAA. There is a specific item, marked with a specific
price, able to be taken by a specific customer. This is also why sections of
items get physically covered eg sale displays before the sale starts, alcohol
on sundays, "non essential" items during covid shutdowns.

> _Even if putting an item on a shelf with a price tag is an offer, rather
> than an invitation to treat, I believe I 've seen at least one case that
> said that picking up the item isn't enough to accept--the offer is accepted
> and the contract formed when you actually pay. So even then consuming the
> item before paying would be theft._

Picking up the item clearly isn't enough to accept an offer, otherwise the
store could insist that you pay instead of being able to put it back! That's
actually why I said to consume the item, as it's an action indicating explicit
acceptance. If the intent is to eventually complete your end of the contract,
then it's not theft.

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mchusma
Forcing people to accept dead trees is a silly solution to this problem.

There are real issues in the credit card system, including: 1) huge cost of
credit card transactions (they are about 2) lack of privacy options 3)
disproportionate burden of credit card fees on the poor (the rich get great
rewards, which is a kickback from credit card companies).

The number one thing that could be done to make things better is to force
credit card fees to be borne visibly and directly by customers at all times.
This would force people to generally seek lower cost options.

The number two thing would be to ensure there is a standard for any competing
card network to come along and plug in.

With these two things, you would ensure low cost processing options and the
ability to compete on privacy features.

~~~
Slartie
Limit credit card fees by law to some amount that easily covers the actual
transaction costs and then some, but does not leave endless room for crazy
stuff like kickbacks that effectively eat up 80% of the fees and thus clearly
expose that the real cost of transactions can't be more than 10-20% of the
fees. There you go - Problem solved! No more "tax on the poor", but cheaper
prices for everyone.

There's even been a model for that for over five years in the European
regulation regarding this topic.

------
benjohnson
As long as companies can specify that exact change is required, I'd by ok with
this. Having to break $100 bills adds a lot of stress to small business if
they can't validate them.

~~~
mindslight
As someone who makes it a point to pay in cash (pre-pandemic), I wouldn't have
a problem with the ability to balk at $50 or $100 bills (even though fifties
are the new twenties). It should probably be stated as a percentage of the
transaction though - let's say a business could refuse to give change more
than 20% of the total. That's restrictive enough that businesses would be free
to adopt the strict policy (total has to be at least $84 to pay with a $100),
or relax a bit to something reasonable (say $70 for a $100).

edit: Thinking about it, a fixed ratio wouldn't work well, otherwise you'd
need to spend $17 to guarantee paying with a $20. Good thresholds might be
$80/$35/$10 to reflect the increased incentive to pass larger counterfeit
bills.

~~~
pc86
The problem isn't (always) giving a lot of change, it's being able to verify
that the larger bills are genuine.

None of the fast food establishments near me will accept anything larger than
a $20 and I'm positive there are folks going in there and ordering $40+ worth
of food.

~~~
mindslight
The same thing happens with credit card fraud though. Insisting on small bills
doesn't solve the possibility of giving away free product. Ultimately, the
restaurant's incremental cost of providing $40 of fast food is pretty low. The
main worry is giving out significant real cash in change.

~~~
coredog64
I thought fraud was on the bank for amounts over ~ $20 (which is why
restaurants don't bother to check signatures/ID for typical purchases). They
_are_ on the hook for chargebacks and low-level fraud.

------
supernova87a
The EFF says that being underbanked is the problem for people at the heart of
this matter. So why doesn't it work on making more banks and credit cards
available to those people? Harder, and more root cause, than just advocating
for cash to be accepted, I guess?

~~~
jmnicolas
You can dream of a utopia or you can change the world one step at a time.

~~~
supernova87a
By promulgating laws that don't solve the real problem but put
responsibilities and costs on others to not-quite fix it?

~~~
colejohnson66
A big problem with card only businesses is that they prevent people who don’t
have a bank account from buying. Sure, one could buy a reloadable or prepaid
debit gift card, but those cost extra money just to activate.

By keeping out people with no accounts, you’re excluding a large part of the
population: children and poor people.

------
votepaunchy
> Furthermore, when consumers are forced to pay for goods and services in
> cashless transactions, they (as well as the businesses where they shop) are
> also often forced to incur added expenses in the form of network and
> transaction fees.

I don’t understand this part. The vendor sets prices and knowingly forgoes
cashless transactions. Surely they can be trusted to make an informed
financial decision without this regulation (the arguments regarding cash-only
customers and privacy are separate issues).

------
shireboy
I get the argument (and counter arguments), but regardless of where one
stands, can we all appreciate the irony of the Electronic Frontier Foundation
making an appeal for paper fiat?

~~~
mindslight
Yes, the irony. But it's coming from the same place as technical people being
horrified by the wanton adoption of Internet of Trash devices, and preferring
simple appliances. We know there's a proper way (privacy preserving digital
payments), and until it's there, we'll reject ersatz alternatives.

------
specialist
_" How can you stop data thieves, data brokers, and police from snooping on
your purchase history? Pay in cash."_

What's Apple Pay's privacy and security story?

I know that I should know this. Apologies.

I had understood that Apple Pay does some kind of token exchange, instead of
sending PII and account details over the wire. So this stops all the "edge"
attacks, like card skimmers.

Are there any solutions (currently) that keeps Home Depot, for instance, from
leaking or reselling my PII when I pay digitally?

~~~
sirn
Network Tokenization (Apple Pay/Google Pay) exchange a token unique to {card,
device, merchant}. This token is sent from device, to merchant, to acquirer,
to card network, and to issuer without the need to resolve token to PAN in the
middle (unlike PCI tokenization most payment gateway provides).

AFAIK, three parties that are aware of a purchase history of tokenized cards
are: Token Service Provider who provides the token, Token Requester who offer
the tokenized service (Apple/Google in this case) and a card issuer. Apple Pay
for example, uses First Data as its Token Service Provider. (I'm pretty sure
Google Pay does as well)

------
savant_penguin
> This cohort disproportionately includes people of color and people with
> lower incomes.

You know what disproportionately affects people of lower incomes? Other people
imposing extra costs for doing businesses with them.

I bet that the business refusing cash know a lot of a heck more about the
added expenses of dealing with cash _in their own business_ than me.

This type of action could easily backfire making products more expensive for
people who need it the most.

------
lurchpop
I don’t like the “unbanked” basis for these anti cashless arguments because
they’ll just solve that problem.

------
umvi
Cash has its own problems though - it's much easier to use it to avoid taxes,
launder money, etc. when using cash.

Privacy zealots act like perfect anonymity at all times is a human right and
we should always work towards it at any cost, when really I think most people
agree it's more of a privilege that should only be available under certain
circumstances (in your own home, for example).

~~~
chance_state
> Privacy zealots act like perfect anonymity is a human right and we should
> always work towards at any cost

Why have an original take when you can argue against a ridiculous straw man?

~~~
umvi
I have yet to meet a privacy advocate on HN that doesn't want police
detectives to have an impossible job. If you disagree, please share how you
believe detective work is compatible with strong privacy.

And if you are about to say "as long as they have a warrant..." keep in mind
that the warrant is likely to access privacy-violating information that should
not have been collected in the first place (according to privacy advocates).

~~~
awinder
They asked you to comment more substantially, not build more strawmen.

~~~
umvi
The first part of my top level comment comment was the substantial bit. Feel
free to respond about problems I raised about cash. The second half is a
complaint against the pro-privacy fear-mongering that pops up so often on this
site ("Pass this act or the evil police are going to snoop on us!")

