"No one who works here at CapitalOne would ever tip this much so we just wanted to double-check you were of sound mind when you did this! :)"
this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2024
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I don't understand why credit cards are secured so badly in the states. Here you can't adjust a charge after it has been confirmed (plus you usually have to enter a pin whan swiping the card if the amount is over a certain threshold).
Kind of related: when my family went to the US for vacation and we ate at some restaurant, the waitress came with the bill, my dad said something like "make it $x". When she sait to just write in the tip on the bill and my dad told her that won't work she insisted that thats how it always works (which tbf it probably does for american customers). Sure enough when we checked the card statement later on they just took out the original amount, not the tip writen in.
Huh? There so so many protections with cards. All of my cards can very easily do a charge back and they’ll fight the charge with the retailer, not you. You only use a PIN for debit cards using a debit transaction because it’s a direct transfer, resulting in no card fees, very much the same as cash. No real credit cards have a PIN.
Edit: ah, I see they weren’t talking about American credit cards. My mistake! Interesting to learn that other countries do though.
Only in US. In many (most?) countries, credit cards do have PINs.
Ah, I misread that as American cards have PINs.
Server here, usually with restaurant Point of Sale systems the transaction isn't sent to be processed by the financial institution until the ticket is closed out. (Presumably because tipping culture 🙄) I don't blame your server for not putting her tip on there, if you get caught without sufficient ass-covering (having the guest initial the tip field is what I usually did) that's a fireable offence.
I have always been very confused about whether the tip line on the receipt in the US works with my British cards given that I enter a PIN into a terminal that doesn't show that tip amount.
As of last year I'm pretty sure the tip is deducted from my card, but I don't think that has always been the case. I understand it works based on PIN-authenticated pre-authorisation for a higher amount and they later take your tip+bill from that pre-authorisation.
It doesn't seem very secure but the US always seems behind on card security.
When I first started travelling to the US for work restaurant staff were always extremely confused about why my card needed a PIN. They often tried again and again or said my card wouldn't go through, then worked out that it needed a PIN. Lots of places then had no way to hand you the terminal to enter it, like they would have to push aside mountains of junk to get the terminal out, or invite me round to the other side of the bar because it's literally screwed down.
Not sure why you weren't billed for the tip in your story. Having to write the tip amount down on the tip line of the bill is 100% how it always works in the US. You may have written it on the customer copy of the receipt, perhaps.
It's because unlike with american cards you have to confirm the transaction on the card reader while it shows you the amount (with either a pin or signature in some cases). After you confirmed it the transaction cannot be changed, i.e. the tip cannot be added. So the american way of tipping does not work with foreign cards.