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Amazon will no longer accept Visa credit cards from 2022

Sandra Theres Dony
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Amazon

Online retailer, Amazon will no longer accept purchases made using the Visa credit cards in the United Kingdom starting January next year. The ban on the use of credit cards is owing to the high transactional fees. The announcement concerning the ban was made by the e-commerce giant on Wednesday and Visa isn’t exactly pleased by the turn of events. This is what the emailed statement said,

“As a result of Visa’s continued high cost of payments, we regret that Amazon. co. uk will no longer accept UK-issued Visa credit cards as of 19 January 2022. “

The What and Why

The decision of the e-commerce giant to stop accepting Visa-issued credit cards in the UK was met with some amount of displeasure and disapproval from Visa which was of the opinion that through this decision Amazon was indeed restricting user choice. Whether these same users are happy about the high transactional fees is another question altogether. Although Amazon will stop accepting Visa credit cards, customers will be free to use Visa debit cards, Mastercard, or Amex credit cards, or Eurocard. Thus it cannot be said that the company is completely restricting consumer choice and freedom.

The move by Amazon might be influenced by Brexit to some extend. Ever since Brexit, the usual EU-enforced fee cap is no longer applicable. This fee cap is charged by the ones issuing the card. This decision made by the e-commerce giant has indeed managed to ruffle some feathers within the government. Because, if the reports are to be believed the UK Trade commission did call on the government to devise ways to improve the UK-EU trade agreement while also asking analysts to prod the British regulators to divert their focus and attention to the credit card market fees. The main concern here is the fact that if Amazon with all its resources finds it difficult to wade through the fees, then the smaller businesses will have it much worse. Thus the government must devise some ways to improve the situation since it can have a significant impact on the overall competitiveness and efficiency of businesses in Britain.

Responses On Twitter

Any news that creates a stir will definitely find a place in Twitter town, with Twitterati pouring their brains over the new topic of discussion. Quite naturally, the news of Amazon not accepting Visa credit cards did attract the attention of the Twitter folk, and soon enough “Visa” rocketed to the trending list. Let us flip through a few reactions and responses.

 

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