Mobile phones (Cell phones in US speak) and the 'Why don't you use the app?'

[DickyP]

To make it clear, in UK, if you pay cashless, you don't receive a receipt?

Yes you do but sometimes vendors don't want to or try and just send electronic one. I don't stand for it. The actual law is that for £5 or more they have to offer one, and for less they have to give one if asked.

The real surprise is those people who don't want one! The law applies irrespective of how paid.

However, what the law requires and what people do is somewhat different unless you stick for you rights.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

So he called the support and the guy in help center was in India. I've never heard something as funny as that conversation in my life.

I can imagine, because I've had a few of those myself and was saddened to learn that I probably knew more about computers than the guy on the other end of the line. Of necessity in college, I learned how to understand folks with heavy accents, because at the time, Univ. of New Orleans had a top-level Chemistry department, one of the reasons I went there. The 2nd and later-year doctoral graduate students were asked to help the newcomers. Because of its reputation, we had Chemistry students from nearly every time zone. (A couple of zones are mostly water, so have lower odds on having students from there.) At one time, I had to deal with folks from Pakistan, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Egypt, the Philippines, ... and Texas.

When I was working with the U.S. Navy we had a support contract with COMPAQ and later, with HP (who bought out COMPAQ). In it, we had the right to demand USA-only support staff. I cannot tell you how often I ran into folks with Middle-East accents who wanted to help with a USA Department of Defense computer. But I was within my rights to request a USA support person and usually did so. But I never made that call on a cell phone - because we were not allowed to use them in the building. It house Secure servers and wi-fi is an absolute no-no in Secure facilities.

 

[ColinEssex]

There are a lot of new words for me and I couldn't understand it all.
To make it clear, in UK, if you pay cashless, you don't receive a receipt?

In the UK, if I pay cashless, I am always offered the option of having a receipt or not, I have never paid cashless without first checking the amount for accuracy.
Col

 

[Isaac]

It's a waste of time for both

BUT, it's still not necessarily a waste of time for other listeners/readers, because we can now see 2 points of view and be educated and enriched by reading them. Thus I value even the most determinedly non-open arguer.

 

[KitaYama]

In the UK, if I pay cashless, I am always offered the option of having a receipt or not, I have never paid cashless without first checking the amount for accuracy.
Col

Seems that I have to take a holiday and step outside of the walls around me to see how the world is.
Here, if you buy anything even 1 yen, you receive a receipt. It's not something you ask for. It's something they give you.
If you pay cashless from a pre-charged app, you receive two receipts. One from store, one that shows deducted price from your charge.
If you pay cashless from a unchargable app, you receive three receipts. One from the store , one for the amount deducted from your app, one for the details for the amount of withdrawal and date.

The real surprise is those people who don't want one!

well...again, I'm one of them. They give me the receipt and there's always a trash box in front of the cashier for those who don't need the receipt. I throw the receipt there. In most of our convenient stores, the receipt comes out and they have put the trash box exactly in front of it. The receipt comes out and falls into the trash box. I've never seen anybody purchase from a convenient store and keep the receipt.

I can't understand why do I need one. Most of things here works on trust.
What do you do with your receipts?

 

[KitaYama]

If I sound paranoid,

Not at all. I agree with most of what you explained. The only difference between me an you is, how much of our privacy do we sacrifice for convenience.
You respect your privacy and don't bargain it for convenience, I sacrifice a part of it to have more comfortable life.

I told you that I can not live without my phone for 5 minutes. It's true, but it doesn't mean it's glued to my hand. Rule No1. Never look at your phone when you are with someone. Here, it counts as a very disrespectful acts. Teenagers and even young generation up to their early 20s, are how you explained. They sit at a table, and instead of enjoying being with each other, they are on their phone. But it's only their youth. People understand it. Once they're employed and start their adult life, they really stop that kind of behavior.
While in train or other public transportation, EVERYBODY is on their phone. We don't talk on public areas. Or if we do, it's very short. If you come here and ride a train, I think you will hate us for ever. But, here, we believe a public area, belongs to everyone. So we try not to disturb each other. Well, if we want to keep silence, what's better than checking our phones?

At home, I don't know where my phone is. If I need to use it, I may use my wife's, because it's always on the table.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

I've never seen anybody purchase from a convenient store and keep the receipt.

In the USA, we have learned from various news stories to always take the receipt and dispose of it in a less public place. For instance, I have a cross-cut paper shredder at home and have had one for at least 35 years. If we dispose of a receipt in a store's trash can, we don't know where else it goes, and we have a phrase - "dumpster divers" - to describe people who look in trash to attempt to exploit careless disposal of printed receipts. The correct SECURE way to dispose of receipts is to have a fireplace or barbecue pit or some similar place where you can burn the receipts.

Further, with my yearly Navy security refresher courses, we learned to always look at what ELSE is on the receipt. Many receipts include part or all of the credit card number. Since some of us sometimes carried government credit cards when on "away" assignments, we were always told to bring ALL receipts back for analysis and verification. And bookkeeping, of course. Navy auditors - got to love them.

You would ask... why so cautious? Because when a person can track you AND track electronic cash receipts, they can associate your card with your name and get enough info to fraudulently use your card number. Even if all they have is the last four digits of your card number, they know the prefix codes for all the major cards (first four digits of the number). With eight of the sixteen (or fewer) digits in hand, and for someone who taps the transactions over wi-fi, careless businesses that don't encrypt their wi-fi make it possible for someone to harvest all sorts of transactions easily. The problem there? Some businesses are keenly internet-aware; some are lucky they can reliably turn on light switches three times out of four. And people don't always appreciate just how thoroughly our environment is polluted by wi-fi carrying secure or not-so-secure content.

In our culture, we have a phrase to describe people who exploit this kind of thing... "They will steal anything that isn't nailed down and will bring a pry-bar for any victim who didn't use enough nails."

 

[Cotswold]

There are a lot of new words for me and I couldn't understand it all.
To make it clear, in UK, if you pay cashless, you don't receive a receipt?

If you ask for one you'll obviously be given one but, if it is for something that cannot be returned, what is the point in having one?
If it is a supermarket I'd take one in case they've charged more that the shelf price. Or many items on the till receipt.

 

[KitaYama]

If it is a supermarket I'd take one in case they've charged more that the shelf price.

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

 

[KitaYama]

Because when a person can track you AND track electronic cash receipts, they can associate your card with your name and get enough info to fraudulently use your card number. Even if all they have is the last four digits of your card number, they know the prefix codes for all the major cards (first four digits of the number). With eight of the sixteen (or fewer) digits in hand, and for someone who taps the transactions over wi-fi, careless businesses that don't encrypt their wi-fi make it possible for someone to harvest all sorts of transactions easily. The problem there? Some businesses are keenly internet-aware; some are lucky they can reliably turn on light switches three times out of four.

Doc, I don't want to negate anything or prove you're wrong. Just passing some info.
With recent digital life (the one that DickyP believes is not a real life) these kind of problems are vanishing.
Recent credit cards come with a planted IC chip.
Here, when you use a credit card, either for online purchase or in shop purchase, you insert the cared in a reader and push your 4 digit pin security password, and open a security app on your mobile. The reader contacts with the organization that has issued the card (bank, businesses, etc). They send you an encrypted one time password to your app. This password can be used only for 30 seconds. You input the password on the reader and pay the fee. You're late and don't enter the passcode in 30 seconds, you must ask for a new passcode.
We call this system "3D security", you may have a different name. So having the receipt really is not helpful. If you want, I can send you any of my cards full number. Each bank or organization that issues a credit card, has its own app with its special method. They are not all the same.

One more step over it, We have a insurance on our cards. (possibly you have too). Last year there was a huge unknown fee on our company's corporate credit card. There was an extra $3000 on our payment. We called the bank and per their investigation, there was 12 times of purchases with our card in Australia. (mostly shampoo and bath items). The insurance paid for $3000 and it was done only with one call and 10 minutes of our time. Of course they banned the card number and sent us a new one.

 

[AngelSpeaks]

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

Not a stupid question. A store can put an item on sale (a short term special lower price) and forget to update their computer.

 

[Isaac]

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

Meaning that when you are shopping the sign on the shelf by the item says one price but then you get charged another price it has to do with the systems in the store not matching the advertised price.

Happens all the time here

 

[The_Doc_Man]

@KitaYama - regarding your post #57 above:

In the U.S. Navy that would have been called "three-factor authentication." What you don't recognize is that requiring three factors means that someone in authority must have thought two-factor identification was inadequate - which probably means it was imposed on you in response to misuse / abuse of stolen credit cards. What will be next? FOUR-factor authorization?

Having the credit card is one-factor authentication. Knowing the PIN (that isn't visible anywhere on the card) is two-factor authentication. In the USA (and probably elsewhere), there is a bank-related security app for most banks that, when your credit card gets used for a big purchase (you set the limits on "big" in the app), it sends you a text that asks if you just used the card for an $xxxx purchase at MyOverPricedGoods.COM, and you can say Yes or No. That app and the ability to respond is three-factor authentication. So we often do something similar to your "3D" methods.

Switch to cultural factors: It is entirely possible that this is a generational thing, but in the USA, everyone wants "instant gratification" and so would be reluctant to introduce that third factor. In fact, many are reluctant to employ the second factor. When I shop online for software I will usually run into the 2nd factor when filling out the payment section of the online shopping cart setup. Often, the company will send a short numeric or mixed password to test the accuracy of my information's e-mail, but some of the places do that even before I'm allowed to put anything in the cart. I have therefore seen and used variations on 3-factor verification.

The exact flavor of 3-factor therefore may differ from place to place but some of us are actually aware of using it. And then we have citizens who are barely aware that they are still breathing... but my cynicism is acting up again. Time to wish you a good day.

 

[Cotswold]

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

The shelf price does NOT always match the price that the barcode relates to when you till out. I'm surprised that you've not noticed that fact of life? Where do you think the barcode and shelf prices come from? Most differences are when a shelf item becomes an offer on promotion and the barcode update is a few hours behind.

When I go around a supermarket I'll add up in my head as I put the items in the trolly/basket. I can remember the shelf price for hours or days sometimes. When I've tilled out I expect that the total is the same as I've totalled in my head as a little test. If it doesn't then I'll find the error on the receipt and get reimbursed. (unless they have undercharged me of course, in which case I may miss pointing the error out!)
As I probably said earlier, people are far too trusting and rely totally in technology always being 100% correct. Which it isn't. The only thing you can rely on with a till receipt is the total will always match to sum of the items listed. Most just presume without checking. As it certainly appears to be the case with you.

I knew a guy with a souvenir shop in a seaside town and all of the items in the window had a price ticket on them. Some would come in and ask the price and he'd add 50% and tell them that price. They'd then happily pay him and walk out with their overcharged souvenir.
From what you have said, maybe you were one of those souvenir shoppers who looked and didn't actually see?

 

[DickyP]

Doc, I don't want to negate anything or prove you're wrong. Just passing some info.
With recent digital life (the one that DickyP believes is not a real life) these kind of problems are vanishing.
Recent credit cards come with a planted IC chip.
Here, when you use a credit card, either for online purchase or in shop purchase, you insert the cared in a reader and push your 4 digit pin security password, and open a security app on your mobile. The reader contacts with the organization that has issued the card (bank, businesses, etc). They send you an encrypted one time password to your app. This password can be used only for 30 seconds. You input the password on the reader and pay the fee. You're late and don't enter the passcode in 30 seconds, you must ask for a new passcode.
We call this system "3D security", you may have a different name. So having the receipt really is not helpful. If you want, I can send you any of my cards full number. Each bank or organization that issues a credit card, has its own app with its special method. They are not all the same.

One more step over it, We have a insurance on our cards. (possibly you have too). Last year there was a huge unknown fee on our company's corporate credit card. There was an extra $3000 on our payment. We called the bank and per their investigation, there was 12 times of purchases with our card in Australia. (mostly shampoo and bath items). The insurance paid for $3000 and it was done only with one call and 10 minutes of our time. Of course they banned the card number and sent us a new one.

Yours sounds excellent process to me. And that's where it all falls down for the USA and the UK. People just are not willing to engage in security. They just flash their contactless card and wander off. No idea what they have been actually charged and far worse, no interest.

Indeed talking to an American banker friend of mine who retired recently, the USA never truly adopted chip and pin and just wanted to sign.

This difference in general usage between yours and ours explains a lot of the difference in attitudes described through the thread. Many of we contributors are a bit older (if not wiser) and are thus more sceptical of electronic finance. And you must remember in UK, at least, an original paper receipt trumps all in a dispute over a payment.

 

[DickyP]

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

Two problems here - an item can more than one shelf price in UK(for instance if you are using a Loyalty Card) and in the USA, the shelf price is normally pre-tax so it's not what you pay at the till anyway (usage and tax rates vary by state).

 

[The_Doc_Man]

(usage and tax rates vary by state).

And just to thicken the gumbo, those tax rates that vary by state may ALSO vary based on the product in question. For instance, baby food is taxed at a lower rate than ordinary frozen dinners. Luxury items like jewelry are taxed higher. Therefore, knowing the "label" price doesn't tell you the taxed price because of that category variability.

To add one more touch of spice to the mix, in the USA each county or parish can add a small sales tax to the lump - which is why a few decades ago, when Orleans Parish added an extra 0.5% to the local sales tax they already had, all the car, appliance, and furniture stores moved to other parishes. I remember during my childhood that many stores had a pre-printed tax sheet at the register to look up the tax amount for their parish because the cash registers of that time weren't yet capable of computing the tax rates. That was 70+ years ago when computers were sill based on vacuum tube logic circuits (thus filling and heating a room at the same time), and the computers based on discrete transistor circuit boards were still maybe a decade away.

 

[Slap]

@all you are missing/underplaying the Japanese culture. Mistakes are unacceptable historically so to accept a barcode scan is normal. If it's wrong then someone notices/confesses and the customer is compensated.

Aside from your phone being snatched while unlocked (common in big cities in the UK) you really don't have much to worry about.

Scams themselves are a different matter and mostly the old adage of "if it's too good to be true" should be everyone's starting point. Unfortunately greed often overrides caution.

 

[ColinEssex]

I'm sorry for this stupid question. But since it's the second time it's been mentioned, I can't help it.
Don't they use barcodes when checking out? Here, Every item has a barcode and the clerk or staff, just reads the barcode. So how it's possible to be charged more than the real price?

The price displayed on the shelf may be lower than the scanned barcode price.
Col

 

[ColinEssex]

If I sound paranoid, maybe I am. . .

No comment.
Col