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Comment by lmm

2 years ago

Payment processors are a natural monopoly and as such they should be regulated like utilities, i.e. not allowed to deny service without good reason. Unfortunately the government rather likes having a way to destroy the livelihoods of undesirables without any of that pesky due process.

7 comments

lmm

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wmf  2 years ago

The payment networks (Visa/MC/etc.) may be monopolies but there are ton of processors (Stripe/Paypal/etc.). Sure, all the smaller processors "suck" but somehow they worked before Stripe was founded.

  • somsak2  2 years ago

    isn't the reason that stripe grew so quickly was because these smaller processors don't really work that well?

    i also keep hearing that there's a ton of choice but whenever it's brought up, true alternatives to PP/Stripe are rarely actually given

    • TRiG_Ireland  2 years ago

      A lot of the other options are far more expensive to the service provider. They're mostly used by industries that the big players won't touch (porn, gambling). There is a much higher risk of invalid chargebacks in these industries. (That is, someone genuinely does use their card, and then denies it.) So the processor charges are higher to compensate the extra work involved. (Also because they can.)

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adrr  2 years ago

You have hundreds of choices to take credit cards online. You can just go the traditional method and get a merchant account and payment gateway.

  • rcxdude  2 years ago

    All of them are at the whims of the main networks, however. The policies they set trickles down to affect everyone (see for example how damn hard it is to take payment for porn).