On Thu, 25 May 2006, Neil Williams wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:

In fact, we need to sort out a single worldwide payment system. All
this Maestro-but-not-Delta, Visa-but-not-AmEx, etc, is just retarded.
We've manged to settle on single global standards for almost everything
else that matters, so why not payment?

We mostly have, certainly in the UK - the technology exists to support
the lot. The reluctance to accept AmEx tends to be because that
organisation imposes much more punitive charges on the retailer than the
credit cards do, which only AmEx can sort out.

That's my point - we should have a unified system, so you don't get some
payment operators running round charging silly rates, thus screwing over
customers who have cards which use them. I'm not entirely sure how this
would work, i do admit. Differently!

Double-deck trains! Wheee!

In a nice big loading gauge. Very basic (and sometimes somewhat garish)
interiors, though.

Yes, they were very spartan - even the intercity trains. Maybe it reflects
some sort of ascetic tendency in the Dutch character. Or maybe they put
crappy trains on the lines tourists use .

I don't have any first-hand knowledge, but some reading suggests that
holders of Maestro cards may be shafted good and proper - our Switch
system is being (has been?) rebranded as Maestro, but the system is
still different to what's called Maestro on the continent, so *you
can't use a European Maestro card with a British Maestro till*. The
fact that people stupid enough to make a decision like that are in
positions where they're able to make a decision like that tells you a
lot about what's wrong with British business.

That is really rather silly. Did you have any experience the other way
around - i.e. do UK Maestro cards work fine abroad? (I wouldn't know -
mine's a Visa Delta, but for various reasons, mainly due to fraud
susceptibility, I vastly prefer to pay by credit than debit cards).

Mine's a Delta too, so no idea.

tom

--
Is this the only way to get through to you?