Does anyone what the crack is with these VISA credit/debit cards?

[Mike]

As above - at work we're adding a bit of functionality that adds £6 on if you pay by credit card (yeah, crap I know..) but if someone has one of these VISA debit/credit cards how do we decipher how they want to use it an whether to apply the fee...? without adding a box and giving the user opportunity to offer up even more wrong information....

 

If you have one, when you pay for shopper do you have to say 'erm, I think I'll use it as as a credit card today'....? or is it always one or the other?

 

Or is it just 'VISA' protection on a debit card and they're always debit cards..?

 

I tried to google this but as soon as you type the words credit and card in a search engine I think you know what happens....

 

Very confused.... Snooze are you out there...?

[Alan999]

I have one of these cards and have never had any charges put on it as you would with a credit card. i just got told at the bank they made them visa debit cards so you could use it in more places abroad etc. But then again they did look abit puzzled when i asked them so they may have made it up.

[Pete]

Errr...what new Visa/Debit cards?

 

I'd ask your Merchant Services provider.

[Pixelfill]

AFAIK your talking about Visa Delta cards Mike, These are regular debit cards, but go through the VISA network (as it were) so they can only be used as a debit card, in the same way as Switch or Maestro.

 

I would imagine there is a means to distinguish between the debit and the credit, but it might be an exercise for user (ie select Debit or Credit card)

 

don't know though bud.

 

Mike

[hogmaw]

On a visa debit card there should also be another sign, like Maestro or something. If it is just a credit card, there will be just the visa sign, and nothing else

[Mike]

Cool, thanks for the replies.... still sounds like we're going to get some user error as the VISA sign is invariably more prevalent than the Maestro sign.... hmmm.. yeah, next call Merchant services....

 

It just seems odd that no other sites ask this.. there must be some way of deciphering them.. all I can find is 'all VISA numbers start with a 4'... which is useful..

[Alan999]

Thats what mine looks like if it helps dont no what the rest are like.

[Daston]

that looks the same as my Lloydes TSB debit card

[Gaz Walker]

Yep its a Delta card - the logo will be on the back - its just a debit card version of a Visa credit card...

 

Gaz.

[Pete]

So - there's nothing actually new at all then?

[Snooze]

I guess you're referring to "PrePaid Credit Cards", Sonic? These are a new thing - they've been around in the US for a while and there's a few springing up over here - they're useful for balance control, poor credit history users, etc. Cashplus and Cash2Go are the two I've looked at (briefly).

 

To be honest, I don't know how these are processed - whether they are "Credit" (read - high, usually % transaction fee) or "Debit" (lower, usually fixed) transactions that are used to process them.

 

I fact, you can't realistically in general differentiate between transaction types yourself. Although there IS a big list of "bin numbers" (the prefixes which distinguish different card suppliers, eg. differentiating "Barclaycard Visa Credit Card" from "Lloyds Bank Visa Delta Debit Card), this is a HUGE list, and I believe is issued by Visa (Mastercard do their own for their cards) on a daily basis, so maintaining software to check it yourself is not really viable - only big retailers and payment system providers tend to actually do it.

 

If you want to charge differently for (eg.) Visa (Credit transactions) and Visa - Delta (Debit transactions), the only viable way is to make the user select, and make sure you use a payment gateway/merchant bank that will validate this. If the user selects the wrong type, you just have to display an appropriate error message and make them re-submit.

 

I believe that most vendors who do not differentiate (just offering a single "Visa" option), merely end up swallowing the charges themselves. It means the price of your items (or sometimes just an added "transaction" or "booking" fee) has to include an arbitrary amount which you believe will cover the merchant fees at the other end.

 

Sorry it's not an ideal solution! Good luck!

 

ben

[Mike]

Cheers Ben... I was afraid you'd say that!

 

I think we're going to just offer VISA under a few options;

 

VISA - Credit Card

VISA - Debit Card

VISA Delta

VISA Electron

 

They're the only possibles aren't they?

 

I've got the guy from the bank calling me back although I think you've given the definitive answer there mate... cheers!

[jamesmark]

The card numbers have a prefix at the begining and that seperates them from debit to credit cards, take switch and meastro they always start with 6759 (there are 2 uk banks that dont) its the prefix at the beginning that lets them know,

[Mike]

The card numbers have a prefix at the begining and that seperates them from debit to credit cards, take switch and meastro they always start with 6759 (there are 2 uk banks that dont) its the prefix at the beginning that lets them know,

 

yep... but the prob is there are so many different types of card the list is huge and as Ben said updated daily.... bit of a pain... bloody banks!

[Snooze]

Those four are pretty standard, but I'm not sure about PrePaid Visa cards. It's also going to depend on what your chosen payment gateway actually lets you specify in the interface - all you can really do technically is map from the user input to the payment gateway interface, so all you can offer as a selection to the user is based on what the payment gateway allows you to specify.

 

One other thing that you might consider is that debit cards typically have an "Issue Number", so if the customer wishes to select the debit card option (to avoid the additional fee), you force them to enter an issue number, which will then (if supported by your payment gateway/merchant bank) be used as part of the validation.

 

But it really depends on your choice of gateway: a few payment gateways I've seen accept a "Type" field which allows you to distinguish specific card types. Some distinguish credit/debit cards by the existence of an "Issue Number" field. Some don't distinguish at all, so you can't tell whether the Visa number you're passing will be handled as a credit or debit card and don't know whether to add on the additional fee.

[Snooze]

The card numbers have a prefix at the begining and that seperates them from debit to credit cards, take switch and meastro they always start with 6759 (there are 2 uk banks that dont) its the prefix at the beginning that lets them know,

 

It's actually a 6 digit code referred to as a BIN code (actually, seems to be increasingly referred to as an IIN code), but these are always changing!

 

Interestingly, I just found this: http://all-nettools.com/toolbox,financial

 

It's an online BIN lookup. Now you could try and use this something like as follows:

 

1) User enters card details

 

2) Behind the scenes, you send an HTTP call to the nettools site and parse the response

 

3a) If the Card Type in the response includes "CREDIT", you show a confirmation to the user informing them that an additional fee would be charged and letting them confirm before continuing (with the additional fee added)

3b) Otherwise proceed with the transaction as normal with no additional fee.

 

I wouldn't really advise this because (a) the user experience of throwing the additional fee at them at the last second is really bad and (b) I'm not sure you can guarantee the accuracy of the nettools database.

 

ben

[Mike]

bloody hell mate, that's ace! cheers bud... think I owe you a pint by now!

[Snooze]

You're more than welcome, mate. As well as maybe helping me attone for my wanton meat-eating , it's actually a total relief that after all the fantastic help and advice I've gotten with my car from the members here that I've now got the opportunity to use what knowledge I DO have to help out a fellow member. Keep the questions coming!