Pleasant surprise in Germany
Credit cards are not used as much in Germany as in UK, so it was good to find that both Aldi and Lidl appear to now be accepting them.......at least in the areas we have been visiting.
Comments
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Not used an Aldi or Lidl yet but did use a REWE in Neckargemund the other day and they were the first large supermarket group in Germany to start accepting credit cards some years ago. Most supermarkets in Austria seem to accept them.
David
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Yes; but a word of warning, some of the smaller supermarkets in Germany will not accept all brands of card so have a cash back up just in case. Last year we were near Cochem and a shop (not Lidl or Aldi) would not accept any of my UK cards, all a little
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Most shops/garages display on the entrance doors which cards they accept. Often in the past the mix up has been about which debit cards have been accepted as the Dutch and Germans seem to have a different system where as most credit cards (if accepted) are
either run through Visa or Mastercard.David
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Debit cards are called girocards in Germany. There are two girocard systems in effect, the Maestro card, handled by MasterCard and the VPay card handled by Visa. The VPay system is becoming more popular with the banks as it doesn't rely on a magnetic strip,
but can only be used with the PIN. They are therefore less susceptible to hacking. A lot of banks in Germany are changing over from Maestro to VPay and this can account for changes in acceptance of UK cards, too.In the same way I carry both a MasterCard and a Visa credit card when travelling abroad as I have found in some countries either the one or the other is not accepted.
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With the VPay and the Maestro being what was accepted, we found that none of our debit cards, we have both Visa and Mastercard, were accepted in Lidl/Aldi etc, so have always had to use cash, which was a big disadvantage (being more expensive for us to use, not that we don't have access to cash!).
Hardly any UK banks issue Maestro cards, and I have never heard of VPay.
Something the EU could work on surely?
At home, 99% of our spending is using credit cards. No need to remember what is in the current account (most of our cash is in savings accounts) and only one bill each month.
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They'll have to be quick. It could all change after June.
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I don't use a credit card in the supermarket, but I do sometimes shop in Lidl. Until recently they only took debit cards. I have heard staff in Lidl saying they now accept credit cards so maybe it's a company wide decision.
Lidl and Aldi in Scotland have been accepting credit cards for about 10 years now. I would say their client base has increased rapidly due to that, certainly it did in our local Lidl.
Having to have cash or cash in the bank is a big deterrent to impulse purchases!
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With the almost universal acceptance of girocards in Germany, credit cards have tended to go out of fashion in many areas, I don't think that the consumer is responsible for this trend, but the retail trade. A sizeable proportion is reluctant to accept the 3% or more handling charge that the credit card companies impose. Nowhere in Europe is the supermarket trade more cut-throat than in Germany and the profit margins are consequently very small.
With the spread of internet based banks that don't have their own branches, cash-less purchases are probably no less popular in Germany than in the UK, however predominantly with the girocard.
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Yes the EU have recently cut the charges that can be made to merchants by the cards companies to
.3% for credit cards and .2% for debit cards so in reality not much more than cash by the time it is processed in any volume. This might explain why the likes of Aldi and Lidl have made the move to credit cards.It would be better in my view that the same names were used across Europe for the various cards be that Visa Delta or VPay.
David
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I am now a bit confused! Are Lidl and Aldi accepting VISA debit cards or only credit cards? I am off to Cochem in 2 weeks time, so it would be handy to know, otherwise we will have to use cash.
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I sense the bias to credit cards but we use a Santander Zero (similar to Clarity but no longer available to new customers) AND Caxton FX (preloaded card) which we find very useful (don't use for tolls or fuel as it blocks a set amount which is released when cleared)
Saves carrying lots of cash and has worked everywhere we've been plus less risk if lost.
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I am now a bit confused! Are Lidl and Aldi accepting VISA debit cards or only credit cards? I am off to Cochem in 2 weeks time, so it would be handy to know, otherwise we will have to use cash.
We only use credit cards (Halifax Clarity) so I was referring to credit cards.
No idea about debit cards, but Lidl had Mastercard and Visa (plus other) signs at the tills.
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I have 3 cards, my home Bank Santander with Maestro, ADAC Visa and an ADAC Plus Mobil card with V-Pay and girocard on it. I travel round europe and have had no problem paying by card anywhere, not even at the french pay buy card petrol stations. When shopping
and I want to use a card I look at the shop window which normally has the usable card signs stuck on it or ask before I shop, simples.0 -
Yes, we do that too, and always make sure we have cash just in case.
Neither Aldi or Lidl had any signs on the doors.
However, the problem has been that Maestro and VPay are virtually unknown in UK these days and Mastercard and Visa were not accepted in many shops despite them administering the Maestro and VPay schemes.
Presumably the EU restrictions on charges has had an effect as David said.
Lidl had the signs at the checkout, but the Aldi we used did not, so we asked.
Still problems using CCs in some supermarkets in Holland however.
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Another reason for Brexit no doubt, you pounds we euros.
And by the way, I have never had any problems paying with my (German) cards in the UK, seems to be a british bank thing.
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Germany and Holland are the only places we have had a problem in several supermarkets. No problem in France, Italy, Luxembourg, Lichtenstein, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, US, Canada, Australia.
Switzernd and Austria it was only in Aldi/Lidl.
So I think this is more of a German/Dutch problem due it seems to bank charges and public preferences there.
Looks like changes are happening though.
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Another reason for Brexit no doubt, you pounds we euros.
And by the way, I have never had any problems paying with my (German) cards in the UK, seems to be a british bank thing.
With respect I think it is the Germman and Dutch systems that are out of step with international standards. The main reason for this is the previously high charges that merchants have had to pay and I think the Dutch and Germans have tried to invent systems
to avoid such charges. In the UK both Marks and Spencer and John Lewis held out for years by not accepting credit cards. It was only when they introduced their own cards on which they paid tiny amounts of charges that they started to accept them. They then
introduce customer incentives to tie in the loyalty.David
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Another reason for Brexit no doubt, you pounds we euros.
And by the way, I have never had any problems paying with my (German) cards in the UK, seems to be a british bank thing.
With respect I think it is the Germman and Dutch systems that are out of step with international standards. The main reason for this is the previously high charges that merchants have had to pay and I think the Dutch and Germans have tried to invent systems
to avoid such charges. In the UK both Marks and Spencer and John Lewis held out for years by not accepting credit cards. It was only when they introduced their own cards on which they paid tiny amounts of charges that they started to accept them. They then
introduce customer incentives to tie in the loyalty.David
Write your comments here...Sorry David, but there has been that many posts in discussions about brits having problems paying by card and I must say, I have never heard from my german friends that they have had problems paying with debit/credit cards when
abroad, it would be interesting to hear from Lutz on this.0 -
Sorry David, but there has been that many posts in discussions about brits having problems paying by card and I must say, I have never heard from my german friends that they have had problems paying with debit/credit cards when abroad, it would be interesting to hear from Lutz on this.
I must admit that I have never even tried to use my VPay (previously Maestro) debit card to pay for anything while abroad because I always assumed that it wouldn't work. However, I never had problems withdrawing cash elsewhere using the old Maestro card. However, I was told by my bank that this is no longer possible since they changed over to the VPay system so that have issued me with a free Visa credit card with which I can withdraw cash at any machine anywhere without any charges.
I had problems using my Visa credit card in New Zealand and I recall that I also had problems with my MasterCard credit card somewhere else outside of Europe, although I can't remember where that was exactly.
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We visited Germany in 2013 (Black Forest) and cards were not universally accepted. Was in New Zealand in February of this year and used our cards without any problem at all.
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Another reason for Brexit no doubt, you pounds we euros.
And by the way, I have never had any problems paying with my (German) cards in the UK, seems to be a british bank thing.
With respect I think it is the Germman and Dutch systems that are out of step with international standards. The main reason for this is the previously high charges that merchants have had to pay and I think the Dutch and Germans have tried to invent systems
to avoid such charges. In the UK both Marks and Spencer and John Lewis held out for years by not accepting credit cards. It was only when they introduced their own cards on which they paid tiny amounts of charges that they started to accept them. They then
introduce customer incentives to tie in the loyalty.David
Write your comments here...Sorry David, but there has been that many posts in discussions about brits having problems paying by card and I must say, I have never heard from my german friends that they have had problems paying with debit/credit cards when
abroad, it would be interesting to hear from Lutz on this.To the contrary, it seems to me that reports of UK visitors having problems using their cards abroad have been confined to Germany and Holland, and it is not a problem with the cards themselves but with shops not accepting other than "local " debit cards,
and often not accepting credit cards at all.As Lutz has explained, this was due to high charges by the banks, and also I think due, at least in Germany, to people there preferring to use debit cards over credit cards.
In UK I think CCs are more popular, certainly we find it much better to have one bill each month, and not to leave large amounts in our current account to cover lots of small DC payments.
As many UK visitors are used to having to use cash in shops such as Aldi and Lidl, I thought I would pass on our discovery that these shops now seem to be accepting CCs.
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We visited Germany in 2013 (Black Forest) and cards were not universally accepted. Was in New Zealand in February of this year and used our cards without any problem at all.
We visit New Zealand regularly and some cards can still be an issue. So it isn't just Europe.
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