“By Now Pay Later” (2) – and surcharges

Currently, providers of “Buy Now, Pay Later” services are at liberty to prevent retailers applying a surcharge on BNPL transactions.   

The Reserve Bank has been taking an interest in the growth of the BNPL area – see here.  Until now, however, it has not ruled out surcharges.   At the time of the report (March 2021), it was stated, “The Bank is currently considering the policy issues raised by BNPL providers’ no-surcharge rules. While the PSB has not reached any conclusions at this time, its preliminary view is that the BNPL operators in Australia have not yet reached a point where it is clear that the costs arising from a no-surcharge rule outweigh the potential benefits in terms of innovation.  Over time, however, a public policy case could emerge for the removal of the no-surcharge rules in at least some BNPL arrangements.”

Hence, I was interested to see  that the Reserve Bank has now changed its attitude to such restrictions, stating that merchants should  have the ability to apply a surcharge to customers using a BNPL platform. 

More specifically, it’s stated here that the RBA “has concluded that it would be in the public interest and consistent with its mandate to promote competition and efficiency in the Australian payments system for BNPL providers to remove their no-surcharge rules, so that merchants have the ability to apply a surcharge to those payments if they wish. This approach is consistent with the Board’s long-standing principle in relation to no-surcharge rules”.

Since it’s been reported that the fee to retailers for BNPL transactions is often around 4% and can be up to 6% (see the Reserve Bank study linked above), this could make a difference to the popularity of such platforms, although it probably needs to be acknowledged that there may not be a lot of price sensitivity in the area, given that it’s popular for ” ‘discretionary’ retail purchases” .    And many customers are prepared to pay for convenience, even  Aldi cutomers (who, I would have thought, would be very price-sensitive) who can regularly been seen using “contactless” payments notwithstanding that it involves a surcharge.   

The change being suggested has not yet come into effect, but hopefully it will apply in due course.     This is just one aspect of the RBA’s work in monitoring the retail payments system.    We can be grateful that, due to the RBA’s work,  the average cost to merchants of card acceptance in Australia is well below the equivalent in the United States.   

“Freedom” Friday (2)

Well, it’s a new world, isn’t it?    The rules this time are different to the rules at previous times.    What’s this about “outdoor trading” for retail?    We’re left with a feeling of being micro-managed.   No wonder people give up on trying to understand the details of each iteration.

Ready for outdoor dining!

The cafe has outdoor tables too – where I had my first post-lockdown 6 sit-down coffee on Friday morning

Queues to get a haircut

Restaurants open!

“Freedom” Friday

Today has been billed by the media as “Freedom Friday”.    I suppose we’re now under less restrictions, in that there’s limited dining at cafes and the curfew has gone.    I’m nor sure what the curfew achieved, except to weigh heavily on some of us (including me).

But we still can’t go into a “non-essential” retailer or travel to the regions or to NSW.    I acknowledge that the position about going to Sydney is a decision for the NSW government, which, in spite of the hype about allowing international travellers to arrive without quarantine from 1 November, still hasn’t specifically stated that Victorians will be afforded the same ability.  Perhaps we will?  We must wait!

In the meantime, we’re going out to dinner this evening.

Gardiners Creek

I went for a walk along the bike/walking track from the park next to Vision Australia, past St Kevin’s on one side and Scotch on the other side, to the point where Gardiners Creek joins the Yarra, then for a short distance up the Yarra, alongside the Boulevard behind the Burnley Gardens, opposite Scotch.

Downstream from Glenferrie Road, Gardiners Creek emerges from its concrete banks.

The path is under the freeway for quite a distance – but shared with the bikes!

Impressive bridge across the Yarra

Over the river from Scotch, the pedestrian path winds through the scrub – much more pleasant than competing with bikes for space on the shared pathway.

 

MTC – new season

Information about Melbourne Theatre Company’s next season arrived recently.

Usually, I look through the program with a sense of anticipation, but this time I found it hard to work up much enthusiasm.  We booked several plays this year utilising credits from last year’s cancellations, but although we’ve made it to one play so far (here), we’ve also had two cancelled on us, and the fate of another is uncertain.

So, the booking form sat on the table for a few days.   I noticed that the season for at least some of the plays seemed to be a little shorter next year.    Eventually I took the plunge, and spent the time to book for the plays that appealed.  Hopefully things will work our better next year than they have for last year and this.

Time limits?

Is there a time limit for those Demons banners that still decorate our local streets?   Yes, I know that a premiership after 57 years is worthy of celebration, but for how long?  

Is it time to say that the celebration season is over, now that the Hallow’een decorations are appearing (even earlier than usual, I think)?

Or has lockdown resulted in an open season for decorations of this nature?

 

Overseas travel post Covid

We’re being told that overseas travel is back on the agenda, and (as I’ve mentioned) in fact I know of one person who has in fact booked to travel overseas in December. In this case, there are family issues involved.

The announcement that in NSW inbound Australian travellers from overseas won’t require to quarantine if they’re vaccinated is another encouraging sign. 

Of course, I’ve been looking at the potential for leisure travel.     For example, Fiji is setting out plans to open up to tourists.     They’ve said that a number of tests would be involved, which would add to the cost, but would perhaps be “manageable”.     Hopefully the risk that the rules might change while away is also “manageable”, that is, not too great.   But thinking about it, the main issue that would concern me is, what would happen if, having arrived at your destination, you caught covid?    Seemingly, all your travel plans would be disrupted and you’d be cast into quarantine.  What happens if only one of us catches it?     Or, perhaps only slightly less concerning, what happens if the resort you’re at becomes a “hot spot”?

It probably makes sense to confine early trips to places like Fiji, where our movement would be relatively limited, rather than (for example) to Europe where we would be much more integrated into daily life.   But we keep hearing about the need for students, skilled migrants and the like to come to Australia, so perhaps leisure travel isn’t quite on the agenda yet.  

On the other hand, if flights to Fiji are actually being scheduled, perhaps the day isn’t too far away…..? 

EDIT – here’s an article about what happens if we get covid while overseas. 

Telstra and technology

Our local Telstra store has relocated and part of the new fitout includes a big screen in the window.

But seemingly not even Telstra can get the technology right all the time!

Shortly after it first started operating, there was a fault message on the screen.   Next day, they had the screen partially blocked off.

But within a day or so, all was restored to normal.

 

 

 

Internet Banking

We all heard about the big Facebook outage, but seemingly it happens on other sites too – and we don’t always hear about it.   I get a bit concerned when the internet banking site comes up with an error message, because I wonder if the site has been compromised in some way.    And it can be a little inconvenient at times, too.

No doubt, banks, like everyone else,  have constant issues maintaining the integrity of their sites, so I console myself that it’s in everyone’s best interests for me to suffer a little inconvenience by not being able to have immediate access each and every time I log in. 

 

Quite coincidentally, this report appeared just after I’d prepared the first draft of this post.    For the authorities to say that it’s “almost inevitable that at some point the defences of a significant financial institution will be breached” is obviously of concern but I guess it’s necessary to be realistic about what’s going on in the world.

Dinner

Well, we’re in lockdown (still), but “significant” events still occur.   It was to mark one of these that another delicious meal in a box was delivered to the door.    Of course, all the components are packaged separately, but there are instructions to follow about how to put things together. 

But in our house, rules were made to be broken, so things were re-assembled with a little “flair”.  The end result was great!