Hi,
I have just received from the Halifax, a new Visa Electron card which they are now replacing their Solo cards with. The problem is that most on line places don't take Electron but are happy to take Solo, so what are the Halifax playing at?
Is their any other banks which still do Solo?
TIA Landru
HSBC still do.
Solo is a Mastercard card. Sounds like the Halifax are migrating to Visa.
Whether a particular outlet accepts either card is entirely between them and Mastercard/Visa, and has absolutely nothing to do with the Halifax. The rules for the Solo and Visa Electron card are similar. They must be authorised online, as they are normally linked to an account which can't go overdrawn. Typically the cards willl not be accepted for petrol (where you fill the tank first and pay leter), as there is no guarantee that the transaction will succeed. OTOH Switch and Visa Delta cards can be used to overdraw accounts - hence the distinction. Switch is being phased out in favour of Maestro, but this is just another branding exercise, like changing Access to Mastercard.
There are exceptions. Our local Shell garages accept Solo cards, but Tesco don't for petrol (but do at the checkouts, where if you can't pay you won't get the goods). Don't know about Visa Electron though.
The RBS group certainly still do solo cards (including NatWest).
HTH
BTW You are not alone in your views!
From what I understand under 18s are allowed Electron cards and thus many people will not allow these transactions incase they get into trouble.
Without a hint of irony, "BrianW" astounded uk.finance on 19 May 2004 by announcing:
Actually, MC & VISA probably don't care one jot. It's between the merchant and their acquiring bank.
OK I'll stand corrected on that. Of course they usually have to use the acquiring bank's authorisation centre. So over to you Halifax then...
Brian
Without a hint of irony, "BrianW" astounded uk.finance on 20 May 2004 by announcing:
Again, it's probably bugger-all to do with Halifax; I don't think they do any acquiring.
Yes, Barclays Merchant Services, NatWest Streamline, HSBC or whoever. However what I meant was that it's up to the Halifax to lobby the acquirers to get Electron more widely accepted. After all the acquirers get paid per transaction, so it's in their interests to support as many cards as possible.
BTW I have written EFPOS authorisation software, so I do know a bit about this - although my brain doesn't necessarily work as intended late in the evening!
Brian
Without a hint of irony, "BrianW" astounded uk.finance on 21 May 2004 by announcing:
Surely it's up to VISA, not Halifax. And they almost certainly do support it, but the merchants do not meet whatever requirements (or are not willing to pay whatever fees) set out by the acquirer.
Now there's a coincidence.
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