Online Cash Payments



  • I got a confirmation from Pizza Hut yesterday:

    Order Date/Time: April 16, 2012 / 4:50 PM
    Order Total: $10.80
    Form of Payment:  Cash
    (REMEMBER: Bills larger than $20 will not be accepted for online cash transactions.)

    The simplest reading of the form of payment section is that they accept bills $20 and lower over the Internet. Even giving them the benefit of the doubt and reading it as they only accept small bills at the time of pickup for an order placed over the Internet, WTF? If they're worried about large fake Internet orders, the bill size won't matter becasue nobody will come to pick it up. If they're worried about counterfeit money, how is it better to force the criminal to place their order in person?



  • I would guess it has something to do with the amount of cash the drivers carry*.  If they have $20 in change, then if your largest bill is a $20, they can make change for whatever price.  But if you pay with a $50 and the pizza is $25, they don't have enough change for you.



  • See, you've gotta put your $20 bill on a wooden table, then take a picture of it, then print the picture, then scan it back in, then convert to PDF, then print it again, then fax it to them...



  • @Sutherlands said:

    I would guess it has something to do with the amount of cash the drivers carry*.  If they have $20 in change, then if your largest bill is a $20, they can make change for whatever price.  But if you pay with a $50 and the pizza is $25, they don't have enough change for you.

    The order was for store pickup. Besides, even if it is a delivery restriction, why prohibit on-line orders from paying with fifties but allow telephone orders to pay with fifties?


  • @Jaime said:

    @Sutherlands said:

    I would guess it has something to do with the amount of cash the drivers carry*.  If they have $20 in change, then if your largest bill is a $20, they can make change for whatever price.  But if you pay with a $50 and the pizza is $25, they don't have enough change for you.

    The order was for store pickup. Besides, even if it is a delivery restriction, why prohibit on-line orders from paying with fifties but allow telephone orders to pay with fifties?

    A lot of brick and mortar places wont take fifties either, because why should they? Just carry twenties. Fifties are only good for showing off.



  • @Jaime said:

    If they're worried about large fake Internet orders, the bill size won't matter becasue nobody will come to pick it up. "Bill" is referring to the order total, not your currency. Limiting the size of the order limits their risk.

    That's exactly what they're worried about. It's not about the change at all.

    Pizza is not something you can put back on the shelf and resell to someone else later. Their cost is in the ingredients and prep time, so by the time 'nobody picks it up', they've fully committed to the expense of making the pizza(s).



  • What seems likely to me is that they only accept bills up to $20 in the store (or for delivery). I doubt they would accept large bills for a telephone or in-person order, either. The "for online cash transactions" part just seems like excess verbosity; it doesn't really have any significance.



  • @BlueKnot said:

    @Jaime said:

    If they're worried about large fake Internet orders, the bill size won't matter becasue nobody will come to pick it up. "Bill" is referring to the order total, not your currency. Limiting the size of the order limits their risk.

    That's exactly what they're worried about. It's not about the change at all.

    Pizza is not something you can put back on the shelf and resell to someone else later. Their cost is in the ingredients and prep time, so by the time 'nobody picks it up', they've fully committed to the expense of making the pizza(s).

    I think your quoting is all screwy, but you're wrong: you can definitely order more than $20 online. They'd probably place a callback if the order was large enough, but they're definitely not limiting online orders to $20.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    I think your quoting is all screwy, but you're wrong: you can definitely order more than $20 online. They'd probably place a callback if the order was large enough, but they're definitely not limiting online orders to $20.
    Agreed.  Only takes 2 large pizzas not on sale or with a special deal to break $20.



  • Almost relevant:

     

     



  • @Zylon said:

    Almost relevant:

    I'm actually kind of amazed there's a hotel that doesn't require a credit card.


  • sekret PM club

    @Jaime said:

    @Sutherlands said:

    I would guess it has something to do with the amount of cash the drivers carry*.  If they have $20 in change, then if your largest bill is a $20, they can make change for whatever price.  But if you pay with a $50 and the pizza is $25, they don't have enough change for you.

    The order was for store pickup. Besides, even if it is a delivery restriction, why prohibit on-line orders from paying with fifties but allow telephone orders to pay with fifties?

    Domino's won't even allow you to pay for an online order over $50 with cash at all, regardless of what denomination you plan on using. They require you to either call the store or use a credit card. I can see why, though, to keep someone from ordering $300 worth of pizza to be delivered to some random guy's house. Makes it a little less useful when you're trying to order 6 peoples' worth of food for a game night and nobody's willing to put it on their plastic though...


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @morbiuswilters said:

    What seems likely to me is that they only accept bills up to $20 in the store (or for delivery). I doubt they would accept large bills for a telephone or in-person order, either. The "for online cash transactions" part just seems like excess verbosity; it doesn't really have any significance.

    It could also be that some locations do that, but not others, but since they have a central site, it's easier to just tell that to everybody, rather than trying to keep track of all the local policies.



  • @boomzilla said:

    @morbiuswilters said:
    What seems likely to me is that they only accept bills up to $20 in the store (or for delivery). I doubt they would accept large bills for a telephone or in-person order, either. The "for online cash transactions" part just seems like excess verbosity; it doesn't really have any significance.

    It could also be that some locations do that, but not others, but since they have a central site, it's easier to just tell that to everybody, rather than trying to keep track of all the local policies.

    Yeah, good point.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    @Zylon said:

    Almost relevant:

    I'm actually kind of amazed there's a hotel that doesn't require a credit card.

    Seems to be the norm in some countries (e.g. Netherlands) to not even require a CC to verify.

    Very common over here (Ireland) to hold the room on your CC and pay in cash or via debit card when checking out (our local debit card system does not allow pre-auth).



  • @Cian said:

    @morbiuswilters said:
    @Zylon said:

    Almost relevant:

    I'm actually kind of amazed there's a hotel that doesn't require a credit card.

    Seems to be the norm in some countries (e.g. Netherlands) to not even require a CC to verify.

    Very common over here (Ireland) to hold the room on your CC and pay in cash or via debit card when checking out (our local debit card system does not allow pre-auth).

    You might be able to reserve some places in the US without a CC, but they're going to ask for a CC when you check in. That way if you rack up a bunch of charges or do damage to the room they can charge you.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    @Cian said:
    @morbiuswilters said:
    @Zylon said:

    Almost relevant:

    I'm actually kind of amazed there's a hotel that doesn't require a credit card.

    Seems to be the norm in some countries (e.g. Netherlands) to not even require a CC to verify.

    Very common over here (Ireland) to hold the room on your CC and pay in cash or via debit card when checking out (our local debit card system does not allow pre-auth).

    You might be able to reserve some places in the US without a CC, but they're going to ask for a CC when you check in. That way if you rack up a bunch of charges or do damage to the room they can charge you.

    €850 isn't an uncommon standard credit card limit here. Not a huge amount of recovery they can do from the card if you wreck the room. Also, its mostly a minibar and pay pre view free country here.

    Haven't had to do it in a long while but a cash deposit of ~€100 more than the room charges is the usual if you have no CC or just don't trust them with it - but I'm not sure who you'd trust with physical cash and not a card./



  • @Cian said:

    €850 isn't an uncommon standard credit card limit here.

    Wow. In the US that's the kind of credit limit they give to teenagers, not real adults. My current limit across all cards is over $60k. That's not even particularly high.



  • Until they can email me a pizza, ordering online makes no sense.

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    Until they can email me a pizza, ordering online makes no sense.

    ... yes it does.


  • @El_Heffe said:

    Until they can email me a pizza, ordering online makes no sense.

    And until they can fax me a pizza, ordering over the phone makes no sense.

     

     



  • @El_Heffe said:

    Until they can email me a pizza, ordering online makes no sense.

     

    Ordering online is, like, 100 times better than ordering over the phone. I used to order online for a local place because nobody at the store spoke fluent English and they'd always fuck the order up. But the website wouldn't let me place delivery orders, just carryout. So I'd order carryout online, then call the store and tell them to deliver it. Worked flawlessly.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    I used to order online for a local place because nobody at the store spoke fluent English and they'd always fuck the order up. But the website wouldn't let me place delivery orders, just carryout. So I'd order carryout online, then call the store and tell them to deliver it. Worked flawlessly.
    Where did you tell them to deliver it?  +1 if the answer is "my car in front of the store".

    Back in the late 80s I was at a comedy club where the comic noticed some guy in the audience with one of the early "brick" cellular phones.  Asked to borrow it.  Called Domino's and ordered a pizza delivered to him on stage.  We all stuck around to see if the guy would show up before the comic's set was over.

    As it turns out, he did, but he had some trouble getting the guy at the door to believe he was really there to deliver a pizza to the guy on stage.



  • @da Doctah said:

    Where did you tell them to deliver it?  +1 if the answer is "my car in front of the store".

    Naw, the whole point is that I didn't want to (and was probably too drunk to) drive the 15 minutes to their location, so I just had them bring it to me.

    @da Doctah said:

    Back in the late 80s I was at a comedy club where the comic noticed some guy in the audience with one of the early "brick" cellular phones.  Asked to borrow it.  Called Domino's and ordered a pizza delivered to him on stage.  We all stuck around to see if the guy would show up before the comic's set was over.

    As it turns out, he did, but he had some trouble getting the guy at the door to believe he was really there to deliver a pizza to the guy on stage.

    Heh, not bad. Did he have the number for Domino's memorized or did he have to borrow a phone book, too?



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    What seems likely to me is that they only accept bills up to $20 in the store
     

    I worked in a pizza shop for a while, as a manager/shift-runner. The value of the $50s were usually about the same as the value of the $20s at the end of the night (occasional $100). So it wouldn't make sense to reject $50s! But there was a rule that $50 notes go straight into the safe drop slot, and there shouldn't be more than about $150 in the till at any one time. There was more float in a separate locked area in case it was required, but the main cash horde was behind time-delay.

    @da Doctah said:

    Back in the late 80s I was at a comedy club where the comic noticed some guy in the audience with one of the early "brick" cellular phones.  Asked to borrow it.  Called Domino's and ordered a pizza delivered to him on stage.  We all stuck around to see if the guy would show up before the comic's set was over.

    Jamie Oliver did that once too (from a stage phone), to show that cooking your own food is quicker than ordering delivery. Lucker driver got like a £40 tip!

     



  • @Zemm said:

    The value of the $50s were usually about the same as the value of the $20s at the end of the night (occasional $100). So it wouldn't make sense to reject $50s! But there was a rule that $50 notes go straight into the safe drop slot, and there shouldn't be more than about $150 in the till at any one time. There was more float in a separate locked area in case it was required, but the main cash horde was behind time-delay.

    Having also worked in fast food I can confirm that. That said more and more people are starting to pay with cards (especially Debit Visa\Mastercards which are becoming the norm).

    On that note am I the only one who thinks that trying to pay for fast food with an Amex card is kinda tacky? We didn't accept Amex cards where I work(ed), have no signs up saying so, and the machines wouldn't say "Card not accepted" until it got the declined response back from the bank when someone felt that using their Visa or Mastercard, which we do have signs up saying we accept, was beneath them for some reason.



  • @Master Chief said:

    A lot of brick and mortar places wont take fifties either, because why should they? Just carry twenties. Fifties are only good for showing off.

    My credit union's ATM usually dispenses $50s and $100s.  At some Branches the ATMs will only give out 5 $20s the rest are $50s and $100s. But then again why use cash.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Did he have the number for Domino's memorized or did he have to borrow a phone book, too?
     

    Thought experiment: room full of people, nearly all of them local, who have seen every television and heard every radio commercial for Domino's for years and years, with the chosen-because-it-was-easy-to-remember number repeated six or seven times in every commercial.  What's the quickest way to find out the number?



  • @esoterik said:

    My credit union's ATM usually dispenses $50s and $100s.  At some Branches the ATMs will only give out 5 $20s the rest are $50s and $100s.


    This. I usually withdraw cash 80€ at a time to avoid 50€ notes.



  •  Thats because getting a credit card isn't as easy in the Netherlands.

    I can't get a CC, and I work a average paid fulltime job. I believe the requirements for me would be to make 25k a year in dollars (19k in euros), and even then my limit would be very low (like 1k).

    Also,  I only need a CC when I want to buy something from n American shop. In the Netherlands 95% of the people pay with a debit card, wirhdraw cash from ATM's with it, or pay using a debit card like electronic banking system.

    We have 7556 ATM's throughout the country, and each year more then 2,285 billion transactions are made in shops using debit cards. (remember, there are only 16,9 million Dutch people.

     

     



  • @da Doctah said:

    @morbiuswilters said:

    Did he have the number for Domino's memorized or did he have to borrow a phone book, too?
     

    Thought experiment: room full of people, nearly all of them local, who have seen every television and heard every radio commercial for Domino's for years and years, with the chosen-because-it-was-easy-to-remember number repeated six or seven times in every commercial.  What's the quickest way to find out the number?

    131 888 - same number nationwide.
    In a share house once we had two floor-to-ceiling stacks of empty Dominoes pizza boxes. Our landlord told us to remove them because they were attracting rats or something.



  • @El_Heffe said:

    Until they can email me a pizza, ordering online makes no sense.

    Are you confusing "ordering online" with "receiving online"..?

    I had a similar argument with my father this weekend, when it came to renewing a passport. I can fill in forms online, or download forms and send them off, but either method requires the resubmission of my existing passport.

    He was going to grab a form from the local post office for me, but I said that I could do it online. He then huffed about not being able to send a passport online.

    Pedantic dickweed.



  • @Zemm said:

    Jamie Oliver did that once too (from a stage phone), to show that cooking your own food is quicker than ordering delivery.

    It's quicker for him because he's fairly skilled at preparation and cooking. May not always be the same for us.

    However, given the choice of expending the effort of preparation + cooking + cleaning once I'm done versus ordering and continuing with whatever else I'm currently doing whilst I'm awaiting for it to arrive, I'd often pick the latter.

    I tend to indulge in the former when I hold dinner parties, since some like to watch how I prepare and cook - but that's occasions when I devote the time to doing such an activity.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Did he have the number for Domino's memorized or did he have to borrow a phone book, too?

    My boss had it on speedial on her home phone. She wasn't surprised to find that a BT bill suggested she record it as her "best friend" for bulk call savings.



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Naw, the whole point is that I didn't want to (and was probably too drunk to) drive the 15 minutes to their location, so I just had them bring it to me.
     

    FIFTEEN MINUTES BY CAR?!? You prefer cold pizza? May I assume you do not live in a city?

    I know Dominos is terrible

    Maybe American Dominos is shit, but the one down the street from me is fucking awesome, and quite a bit cheaper for the same quality as New York Pizza, one street further.



  • @esoterik said:

    My credit union's ATM usually dispenses $50s and $100s.

    What mythical ATM is this? It needs to move to Australia.

    @dhromed said:
    Maybe American Dominos is shit, but the one down the street from me is fucking awesome, and quite a bit cheaper for the same quality as New York Pizza, one street further.

    The store at home has it's good days and bad... me and one of my coworkers got pizza for lunch and mine was overcooked and hers was slightly so as well. The cheesy garlic bread, though, was perfect. Except for the Miscellaneous Piece Of Plastic that I found with it...



  • @morbiuswilters said:

    Wow. In the US that's the kind of credit limit they give to teenagers, not real adults. My current limit across all cards is over $60k. That's not even particularly high.
    $60k? That's 2 years worth of (net) salary for a modal household here in the Netherlands (or France, or Germany, or England...). Small wonder the world is in a debt-crisis ...


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @Cassidy said:

    @Zemm said:
    Jamie Oliver did that once too (from a stage phone), to show that cooking your own food is quicker than ordering delivery.

    It's quicker for him because he's fairly skilled at preparation and cooking. May not always be the same for us.

    It also assumes that you have the ingredients on hand and ready to use (i.e., not frozen). Also, pizza crust takes a fair amount of time, if you're really making something similar. The pre-made crusts aren't terrible, but they're not nearly as good as a proper fresh crust. Silly comparisons like this remind me of "I, Pencil."


  • Trolleybus Mechanic

    @morbiuswilters said:

    Did he have the number for Domino's memorized or did he have to borrow a phone book, too?
     

    Maybe it was on the brick's [url="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102250/"]voice dial[/url]

    @L.A. Story said:

    Steve Martin (carefully enunciating to brick phone): Dial Mom

    *ring*

    Answer: Domino's pizza...




  • @dhromed said:

    Maybe American Dominos is shit, but the one down the street from me is fucking awesome, and quite a bit cheaper for the same quality as New York Pizza, one street further.
     

    New York Pizza is the same chain pizza.  Dominos bears no resemblance whatsoever to an actual pizza of the sort you get in a non-chain pizza parlor in New York and environs (most non-chain pizza in NJ, for instance, is pretty good).

    @Douglasac said:

    On that note am I the only one who thinks that trying to pay for fast food with an Amex card is kinda tacky?

    Yes.

    Dunno, I pay for things with my Amex where possible because they give me better "rewards" than Visa or Mastercard.  Why, do some people wield their credit cards as some sort of bling?

     



  • You can get high credit limits by simplying lying about your income on the application.  They don't check that.  It's "household income" so there is no way to verify it.  Whether or not doing this is helpful to your credit is dependant on your situation.  I think the ratio of debt to available credit affects your credit standing.  Not saying this is a smart thing to do, just something I discovered applying for credit cards as a teenager.  I don't recommend it unless you intend to buy a bunch of shit and default on it.  I like to keep high limit cards empty in case of terminal illness, though.

    Yea, I'm implying that I might rack up a bunch of debt, die, and default on it.  I bet some of you will get really pissed reading that.  Don't care.



  • @Douglasac said:

    On that note am I the only one who thinks that trying to pay for fast food with an Amex card is kinda tacky?

    Why? I always use Amex first and if they don't accept that, then Visa. Most national stores accept Amex, I think, it's just local retail or service stores that don't.



  • @Sitethief said:

    We have 7556 ATM's throughout the country, and each year more then 2,285 billion transactions are made in shops using debit cards. (remember, there are only 16,9 million Dutch people.

    The US has about 17.75 times the population of Dutchlandia. We have over 400k ATMs, 52.93 times as many as you. Last year we had approximately 46.367 billion debit card transactions, 20.29 times as many as you. I can't find recent statistics on credit card usage, but historically it's been close to debit card usage, so we can assume around 40 billion credit card transactions last year.



  • @dhromed said:

    FIFTEEN MINUTES BY CAR?!? You prefer cold pizza? May I assume you do not live in a city?

    Yes. No. I did which is why it took 15 minutes to drive 3 miles. But pizza places put the hot pizza right into their little insulated bag and even if it takes 15 minutes it's still hot enough to scald the roof of your mouth when you get it.

    @dhromed said:

    Maybe American Dominos is shit, but the one down the street from me is fucking awesome, and quite a bit cheaper for the same quality as New York Pizza, one street further.

    Dominos isn't really shit (since they revamped their entire operation a couple of years ago), it's just that there are so many far better places to get pizza in most of the US.



  • @pnieuwkamp said:

    @morbiuswilters said:
    Wow. In the US that's the kind of credit limit they give to teenagers, not real adults. My current limit across all cards is over $60k. That's not even particularly high.
    $60k? That's 2 years worth of (net) salary for a modal household here in the Netherlands (or France, or Germany, or England...).

    It's not 2 years of salary for me; why would my credit limit have anything to do with what some family in Europe could afford?

    @pnieuwkamp said:

    Small wonder the world is in a debt-crisis ...

    That has more to do with people using credit they can't afford. A $60k credit limit in itself doesn't mean much unless you're carrying $30k on it.



  • @pauly said:

    You can get high credit limits by simplying lying about your income on the application.  They don't check that.  It's "household income" so there is no way to verify it.

    Of course they can verify it. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't, but don't lie and pretend it's not possible for them to ask for proof of income. You lied and slipped through the cracks but I would assume you are the exception.

    @pauly said:

    Yea, I'm implying that I might rack up a bunch of debt, die, and default on it.  I bet some of you will get really pissed reading that.  Don't care.

    Wow, your greed and selfishness know no bounds. Bravo.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @morbiuswilters said:

    It's not 2 years of salary for me; why would my credit limit have anything to do with what some family in Europe could afford?

    Fairness, you evil 1%-er, you.



  • @boomzilla said:

    @morbiuswilters said:
    It's not 2 years of salary for me; why would my credit limit have anything to do with what some family in Europe could afford?

    Fairness, you evil 1%-er, you.

    Sadly, no. I'm only in the top, like, 9%. I'd have to make significantly more to even crack the top 2%.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @morbiuswilters said:

    @boomzilla said:
    @morbiuswilters said:
    It's not 2 years of salary for me; why would my credit limit have anything to do with what some family in Europe could afford?

    Fairness, you evil 1%-er, you.

    Sadly, no. I'm only in the top, like, 9%. I'd have to make significantly more to even crack the top 2%.

    You're just thinking too small. I think it only takes about $47.5K to be a world-wide %1-er.



  • @boomzilla said:

    You're just thinking too small. I think it only takes about $47.5K to be a world-wide %1-er.

    But the world is full of dirty foreigners.. I don't want to lord my wealth over them, I want to lord my wealth over middle class Americans.


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