TexasCHLforum.com

bbhack wrote: ↑Tue Sep 13, 2022 12:41 pm From the article:

Visa said it would adopt the International Organization for Standardization’s new merchant code for gun sales, which was announced on Friday. Until Friday, gun store sales were considered “general merchandise.”

Seems like it applies per transaction not per retailer. So, if you go to Academy to buy lures, it would show a different code than if you were to buy a pistol. I don't know.

It cannot apply per transaction, just per retailer. According to the parts of the standard that are public (and all of the news media so far), the code is assigned to a store by the company that is processing their transactions for them. The processor has to make sure the codes meet the standard that the credit card issuer will use, so they normally will use the ISO standard codes.

You can still get receipts from small stores where the actual items are not even listed. My hobby shop, for example, use an old register to ring up the sale by amount. If you pay by cash, it goes in the register. If you pay by credit card, they walk over to a small terminal where they manually enter the amount to charge and then swipe (or insert for chip) the credit card. All anyone could tell from the credit card transaction is that the purchase was at Dibble's Hobbies and what kind of store it is.

Consider the difficulty of deciding how to report individual items. Sure, if I purchase one item the transaction could be classified. But what if I purchase a gun, two boxes of ammo, a bow and some arrows, some camo clothing, some rods and reels and other fishing equipment all at one time. How would you classify that transaction? And remember that it is just one transaction to the credit card company. Since a computer needs to have clear cut rules in place (they are pretty bad at judgement calls) it would probably decide based on either the largest value item, the largest value category, the most items in a single category, or the overriding single classification of the store. The simplest way for everyone is to classify the store, which is what the standard says it does.

So, Academy is a sporting goods store, Joe's Guns was a general goods store but now has its own classification as a gun store, Tractor Supply is an automotive store (with a name like Tractor Supply, automotive would be a good guess for what they wanted to be known for), and H.E.B. is a grocery store. And in every single one of them, I can buy something that is not what the classification says.

The really weird thing is this does nothing about gun or ammo sales at all, and will not provide anyone with any meaningful data. The code is for what kind of store is making the sale. How do you define a gun store? For example, there are two stores that sell guns and ammo that I would never use. Are Dick's or Walmart gun stores? Also, not every purchase from a gun store is guns or ammo. I can buy accessories and other supplies such as flashlights from a gun store.

So the big question now is how does the credit card company decide who is a gun store versus a sporting goods store versus general merchandise store? I am assuming the credit card company gets to make the decision on what the store is.