• Nalivai@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    If you have an account in any European bank, you can pay by bank transfer or SEPA in basically any European business, and often it’s their favourite way to do it because there is no commission. I don’t know country by country, but in Germany the standard for payment system is Girocard which is German payment processing, and the cards usually come equipped with both it and some American standard like visa and mastercard, but a lot of people opt out, if they don’t care about payment outside of Europe.
    Any car rental worth it’s salt in Europe will accept some form of SEPA, but also, renting a car is not an essential part of people’s lives here, so it’s not even something people care about that much

    • Damage@feddit.it
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      3 days ago

      but also, renting a car is not an essential part of people’s lives here

      It may not be part of your life, but I’ve done it hundreds of time as a travelling tech (plus a few as a tourist), and I’ve had times when airports with hundreds/thousands of rental cars had trouble satisfying demand, so it seems there are others with the same need.

      And no, they don’t accept SEPA, although terms vary by country, and if they do they require a safety deposit that can go from a few hundred euros to the thousands, not exactly practical.

      • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        Being traveling tech is absolutely not usual occupancy, so it doesn’t change what I said. But if you work in Europe and traveling around, and moving around instruments is part of your job, you should have a company card anyway for it, so again, it doesn’t really matter for the rest of Europeans.
        What I’m trying to convey, that even though you will have some incompetence without American run banking systems, unless you’re in a very specific operation, like needing to rent a car at an airport for example, you wouldn’t be severely inconvenient.
        I’m saying it as a refugee from a country that (for justifiable reasons) is getting some negativity around, and being born there I’m deemed not actually a good person in advance, and it took me a lot of time to convince various governments that I’m not a dangerous exemplar of my race. The time I spent without access to international banking systems like Visa weren’t debilitating, even though inconvenient at times.

        • Damage@feddit.it
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          2 days ago

          Being a travelling tech is fairly common, but even more common is being a sales rep or any other office worker that requires travelling. Who do you think takes the thousands of flights that go everyday between european airports, all tourists?

          Not having access to those circuits IS a handicap, also because once you’re outside the EU, they’re your only option. But hey, if you people want to cover your ears and avoid listening, I will not waste any more time.

          • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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            2 days ago

            Being a traveling whatever and having to pay out of pocket for your transportation not only isn’t common, a lot of the time it’s illegal. And if your company setup that you pay first and get reimbursements later, you just ask your boss to issue you a company card since yours was taken away for trying to whistleblow, it’s entirely not a big deal.
            You’re comming up with more and more contrived scenarios that are based on more and more improbable sets of circumstances that only work if you saw Europe on TV and imagined that it’s like America but people talk in funny way.

            • Damage@feddit.it
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              1 day ago

              Being a traveling whatever and having to pay out of pocket for your transportation not only isn’t common, a lot of the time it’s illegal.

              who said I did?

              You’re comming up with more and more contrived scenarios that are based on more and more improbable sets of circumstances that only work if you saw Europe on TV and imagined that it’s like America but people talk in funny way.

              Idk, I relied my experience, but whatever, you’re right, I don’t know exactly what you’re trying to prove, all I’m saying is that renting a car without a VISA/MasterCard is difficult, but whatever, you guys seem to have taken it as a matter of honour to prove me wrong, when actually recognising issues we have in the EU due to our dependency on the US seems way more productive to me, but yeah I’m tired of arguing with… you.

      • ClamDrinker@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        How is a deposit not practical? Unless they require it in cash that has to then at the end be picked up at the pickup point (which would be crazy)? A rental company is taking a huge risk by renting cars to any random person with a driving license. It’s the same reason they don’t typically rent to people below 25 (or without a higher deposit).

        It’s really only unpractical if you don’t have enough money on your account to afford the deposit, but then why are you renting cars? Otherwise you just pay a bit more the first time and then get that money deposited back on your account when you return the car. There’s basically no difference in the end other than a bigger number the first time, and if you wreck the car or something, you will lose the deposit through your credit card too.

        • Damage@feddit.it
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          2 days ago

          How is a deposit not practical?

          You need to have the money and manage it going back and forth, a credit card’s CREDIT requires 0 management.

          A rental company is taking a huge risk by renting cars to any random person with a driving license.

          Yeah, that’s why they like credit cards, they can guarantee a safety deposit HIGHER than your monthly withdrawal limit.

          It’s really only unpractical if you don’t have enough money on your account to afford the deposit, but then why are you renting cars?

          Let’s say I’m poor, my car breaks down, I need to go to work otherwise I’ll lose it, not everywhere has public transport options, I guess if I don’t have an extra 1k€ on my account to pay for the deposit, I can get fucked, right? Shouldn’t have been poor.

          • Nalivai@lemmy.world
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            2 days ago

            Let’s say I’m poor, my car breaks down, I need to go to work otherwise I’ll lose it, not everywhere has public transport options, I guess if I don’t have an extra 1k€ on my account to pay for the deposit, I can get fucked, right? Shouldn’t have been poor.

            Shit americans say, I swear.
            My man, if you rely on a car for work but your company doesn’t provide you transportation, you’re being exploited. If you live in the middle of the forest so there is no public transport around because squirrels keep chewing tram rails or whatever, but whatever your employer is paying you isn’t covering your anti-squirrel measures, then again, you’re being exploited. Contact your union rep, quit your job, find something normal. If you can’t find anything, apply for one of a many government programs that will pay you stipend to learn skills that will allow you to start working for something other than whatever shady shit you did before.
            But we’re glaring over the most fun part of this all, the fact that I don’t think there are places in Europe where you can rent a car from a renter that requires you to pay only with MasterVisa, but there is no public transportation around.

            Add to this the fact that you talk about credit card as if it’s normal to have one in Europe, and I am beginning to suspect that you don’t actually know what you’re talking about

            • Damage@feddit.it
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              1 day ago

              Shit americans say, I swear.

              Do you see the TLD on my instance?

              long fucking tirade about whatever

              look I like arguing just as much as the next person - no wait I don’t! I don’t even know why I’m arguing about this about people who don’t want to listen, so whatever man, keep living in your fantasy land you’re lucky enough to live in, I hope you never have to come out here with the dirties.

          • ClamDrinker@lemmy.world
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            1 day ago

            How are you getting a credit card in that last situation? You need a steady income and good credit that is able to pay the full credit at the end of the month to even apply for one. Which your hypothetical doesnt have…

            And as the other person said, it’s pretty ridiculous to go rent a car if you’re in that situation because of how cheap and good public transportation is.

            There’s nothing you need to ‘manage’ about getting money back aside from checking your bank statement to make sure it went well. You would have to check that on your credit card statements too because deposit theft can happen just the same there too. But deposit theft is crazy uncommon to begin with.

            And deposits are typically not 1k around here but like maybe 100-200 bucks at best, and on the lower end for your poor smuck example too.