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Comment by WastingMyTime89 | Hacker News Reader

> * Transactions are final. The merchant has no risk of chargebacks. > * Transactions are bounded. Once you walk away, the merchant cannot take more money from you. Whereas with credit cards, they could store your number and charge you again at a later date, without your knowledge.

> * The amount transferred is known to you. Whereas with credit cards, the merchant terminal could lie and show you an incorrect amount, and you could approve the fraudulent transaction.

> * The maximum amount you can lose is limited by the amount of cash in your wallet (let's say $100), not by your credit limit (let's say $3000).

To be fair, all of these are American oddities. In Europe where people mostly use debit cards and neither chargebacks nor returns for functional goods bought in store exist, all of these are true for card transactions. Only the privacy point remains.

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Keep in mind that privacy doesn't apply to cash transactions when either party reports the income or uses the expenditure as a tax deduction.

Hmm, I believe it does. Not in all cases, but in a substantial number of them.

I can use cash to buy groceries or a soda at the corner store each day, and while I suppose I'm not entirely anonymous to those parties I may as well be. The grocery store is certainly reporting my cash transaction to the appropriate authorities.

Sure, this doesn't apply for all use cases. However, it applies for a lot of things that currently are tracked by using electronic forms of payment. These spending patterns were simply not tracked on an individual basis until the advent of the shopping club cards, which eventually became redundant due to the use of electronic forms of payment.

The level of tracking from "I take out $400 in cash every payday from the ATM" vs. "I spend it in $10 increments on the following items" is wildy more invasive.

When individuals report income, they don't report the person that gave them that money.

Example, as a teenager mowing lawns for your neighbors, you just told the IRS you made $x,xxx mowing lawns for the fiscal year. Not that your neighbor named Susan at 1234 fake street paid you $xxx/month to mow her lawn 4 times a month, or that Joe from 4321 real street purchased the upcharged package that includes managing his compost bin.

Cash is the undisputed champion of privacy for financial transactions.

The merchant will probably report gross income for tax purposes and will only reveal details at an invoice level if an audit is triggered. Even then most likely only a sampling of the transactions will be analyzed.

However since the transactions are cash, no identifying information will be shown, so it's anonymous.

As the buyer I have the CHOICE to declare it as a deduction or not. So it is also anonymous at my discretion.

> To be fair, all of these are American oddities. In Europe where people mostly use debit cards and neither chargebacks nor returns for functional goods bought in store exist, all of these are true for card transactions. Only the privacy point remains.

Are they? I can't speak for Europe, but in Australia we have a chargeback system. If I don't recognise a transaction on my credit or debit card, I can request a chargeback via the bank.

It would surprise me if none of the 40+ countries in Europe offered this. What do you do if there's a transaction you don't recognise?

There is a chargeback process. It's a very rarely used exception I believe, and also incurs substantial follow up (usually some form of legal proceedings).

Debit cards are different from credit cards in the US as well.

So if someone steals or clones your debit card and pin in Europe, you are just out that money? What if a store charges you more than you were told?

In Vietnam, you're out. Good luck getting any response from the banks there.

Your can disable the card through the website or the app. Maybe by phone but I would have to check. You can of course do it in person too. The store HAS TO give you the receipt and all transactions are sent to the tax administration. If they were to take more, and somehow do it in a way where you wouldn't notice it by the time you've left the store, your can still take legal action and the bank can revert the transaction.

In speaking for how it is in Slovenia, it might be different in other EU countries.

It would not be difficult to rig up a method to generate a fake receipt to give to a customer.

I think you mean these are credit card oddities. We have debit cards here as well, and I assume Europeans have credit cards

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