Warning to Playero customers using credit cards

[tmnyc]

OK, so if I understand you correctly, the only benefit of DCC is to give assurance and peace-of-mind to customers who may be mathematically challenged, but the transaction will always cost more regardless of which card you are using and the terms of that card. Have I got that right?

Yep, absolutely, the DCC transaction will ALWAYS cost more regardless of which card you are using. The only benefit is seeing a charge in a familiar currency and not in Monopoly money.

Imagine dealing with this after a some Jumbo Presidentes.

 

[rhanson1]

Yep, absolutely, the DCC transaction will ALWAYS cost more regardless of which card you are using. The only benefit is seeing a charge in a familiar currency and not in Monopoly money.

Imagine dealing with this after a some Jumbo Presidentes.

OK, got it.

For what it's worth, I went back and dug out my Playero receipts for the past few months. After some of the responses on this thread, I was getting concerned that perhaps I was losing my mind, so I had to find out if that was true. When comparing a normal Playero receipt with a DCC Playero receipt side-by-side, I can see now that there is actually a very noticeable physical difference in that the DCC receipt is about a third longer. The additional length on the DCC receipt is used to accommodate the illegible statement saying that I have agreed to use DCC for this transaction along with the calculation showing the exchange rate used and the amount being charged in U.S. dollars. But of course I never paid any attention to that because I had never had a problem.

The other noticeable difference that is see now is that there is a heading near the top of the recent Playero receipts that says “Venta con DCC”, whereas the heading on the older Playero receipts says “Venta Normal”. I never paid any attention to that either but even if I had, it would have meant nothing to me. And what I found from reviewing my receipt history is that the heading on every older Playero receipt says “Venta Normal”, while every Playero receipt starting in early August says “Venta con DCC”.

I probably would never have noticed the sudden change in exchange rate if it were not the fact that I began using a new credit card for the first time. I don’t usually bother to calculate the exchange rate on my credit card purchases because there has never been a reason to. But I did on this first purchase using the new card in order to confirm that the new bank was giving me the proper rate. When I discovered that it was a substantially lower exchange rate, of course I initially blamed the bank and was prepared to call them to complain. But before I did, I decided to compare it with my other recent purchases using my old card that I knew was giving the prevailing exchange rate. I was surprised to find out that I had been getting that lower rate with the older card on recent purchases as well. That’s when I started digging deeper and came to the realization that the problem was with Playero, and that it had begun and remained constant since early August.

But I’m glad to get to the bottom of this. All I need to do is to be sure to tell the cashier to do the transaction in pesos. And if she fails to follow my instructions, the DCC transaction will be immediately noticeable to me now, so I can simply refuse to sign the receipt and ask the cashier to void the transaction and process the transaction again in pesos.

 

[tmnyc]

OK, got it.

For what it's worth, I went back and dug out my Playero receipts for the past few months. After some of the responses on this thread, I was getting concerned that perhaps I was losing my mind, so I had to find out if that was true. When comparing a normal Playero receipt with a DCC Playero receipt side-by-side, I can see now that there is actually a very noticeable physical difference in that the DCC receipt is about a third longer. The additional length on the DCC receipt is used to accommodate the illegible statement saying that I have agreed to use DCC for this transaction along with the calculation showing the exchange rate used and the amount being charged in U.S. dollars. But of course I never paid any attention to that because I had never had a problem.

The other noticeable difference that is see now is that there is a heading near the top of the recent Playero receipts that says “Venta con DCC”, whereas the heading on the older Playero receipts says “Venta Normal”. I never paid any attention to that either but even if I had, it would have meant nothing to me. And what I found from reviewing my receipt history is that the heading on every older Playero receipt says “Venta Normal”, while every Playero receipt starting in early August says “Venta con DCC”.

I probably would never have noticed the sudden change in exchange rate if it were not the fact that I began using a new credit card for the first time. I don’t usually bother to calculate the exchange rate on my credit card purchases because there has never been a reason to. But I did on this first purchase using the new card in order to confirm that the new bank was giving me the proper rate. When I discovered that it was a substantially lower exchange rate, of course I initially blamed the bank and was prepared to call them to complain. But before I did, I decided to compare it with my other recent purchases using my old card that I knew was giving the prevailing exchange rate. I was surprised to find out that I had been getting that lower rate with the older card on recent purchases as well. That’s when I started digging deeper and came to the realization that the problem was with Playero, and that it had begun and remained constant since early August.

But I’m glad to get to the bottom of this. All I need to do is to be sure to tell the cashier to do the transaction in pesos. And if she fails to follow my instructions, the DCC transaction will be immediately noticeable to me now, so I can simply refuse to sign the receipt and ask the cashier to void the transaction and process the transaction again in pesos.

Yes, It's unfortunate. If the customer is not given the opportunity to OPT-OUT of DCC, then I would have to say it's a deceptive practice.

For all the naysayers, there you have it. This is not "normal" or OK.

It is a basically a "Gringo Tax" since the populace has Dominican bank-issued credit/credit cards they can not be hit with DCC, and the transaction will be processed as a "Venta Normal". So foreigners/tourists pay more. Two-tier pricing of the tourism industry is bad business. If it is okay to charge foreigners more than Dominicans then it must be okay for everybody else to do the same. Hence, shopkeepers, market stallholders, etc, will often quote higher prices to foreigners than to the locals. It is a widely held assumption that all foreigners are wealthy and should pay more than the locals.

 

[RDKNIGHT]

$4bucks..lmao please take up Dominos

 

[tmnyc]

$4bucks..lmao please take up Dominos

Too bad you don't understand the big picture. Consumers are being rooked to the tune of billions of dollars a year. Some merchants charge up to 18% for DCC. If you don't decline the DCC, how do you know or control the rate or fee the merchant charges for the courtesy conversion?

Unsuspecting British travelers are losing £1m (1.3 million USD) per day through “dynamic currency conversion” (DCC).

No, I'm LMAO, I guess I rather play dominoes then be wilfully obtuse.

 

[rhanson1]

Okay, all clear now, it is over DCC and the fact that the cashier didn't ask for it clearly from the customer.

Despite the above 4% is an amazingly low (good) rate for DCC ... ! Maybe that's why nobody notices it and they can get away with it.... lol

So from now on asks specifically to be charged in local currency (not DCC), problem solved... (well, for those who know, unsuspecting tourist, tough !)

I recall the incident many years ago when a thief stole a credit card from my wallet. I was at the gym working out, and my clothes were secured in a locker in the locker room. A thief entered the locker room and picked my lock to open it. My wallet contained a fair amount of cash and many credit cards. But the thief never touched the cash and he took only 1 card. Consequently I never noticed anything amiss.

It wasn’t until a few days later when I wanted to use my card at the gas station that I realized it was missing. But even then it never occurred to me that the card could have been stolen because I knew that the card had been secure in my possession at all times. So I assumed that I must have left the card at the last place where I used it. But when I returned there to hopefully retrieve my card, they told me that they did not have my card and nobody had reported finding it. So at that point I just assumed that the lost card would eventually turn up in the washing machine or under the car seat or some other stupid place like my lost things usually do.

A few days later back at the gym, I overheard a couple guys talking about how the locker room had been hit with a bunch of credit card thefts the previous week. They explained that the thief would enter the locker room, open a locker by picking the lock, and remove just 1 credit card from a wallet so that the missing card would not be immediately noticeable. Upon hearing that of course, I immediately realized that I had been one of the victims, and I called my bank to report the card stolen. But by then the thief had racked up thousands of dollars in purchases at various merchants in a nearby state.

I realized then how smart that thief was. If he had taken my cash and all my credit cards, I would have immediately noticed and called my credit card companies to report the cards stolen. He likely would have had little if any time to use my cards. But by not being greedy and selecting only 1 card, he knew that this would go unnoticed for a while – long enough for him to rack up some hefty purchases.

The clever scammer is measured and understands that his scam will be short-lived if he is too greedy, particularly if it involves repeat customers. And before certain members here jump all over this post with outrage and indignation, let me state that I am not accusing anyone of anything. It is entirely possible that the implementation of this DCC scam on multiple consecutive purchases by different cashiers for many weeks was simply employee or machine error. And as I stated before, I probably never would have noticed this surcharge on my purchases if it were not for the fact that I was trying out a new credit card and wanted to be sure that the bank was giving me the proper exchange rate. But regardless of the intentions here, I am nevertheless disappointed in the way that I was treated when I returned to the store to seek an explanation. I am also disappointed that despite all the controversy on this thread, nobody representing the merchant has come forward to offer an explanation. But I am grateful that based on the information in the recent post from Chico bill, this complaint has apparently been heard and the problem has been corrected.

 

[dv8]

oh, we are down to personal anecdotes now?
i think the original issue has been sufficiently addressed.
closing time, then.