Woolworths no longer accepts Visa debit

It would seem that, quietly and without notice, Woolworths Australia no longer accept Visa debit at the checkout.

To be more specific, as the Woolworths site explains, the company has not barred the use of debit cards — it has switched to processing payments on those cards via the local EFTPOS network, rather than clearing them through the international credit card networks. As a result, the option to select ‘credit’ as an account doesn’t show up on its payment terminals, but the accounts associated with the card will appear.

This IS effectively the same as denying customers the ability to pay via their preferred account. With the recent change to PINs on credit cards, some credit cards have effectively become EFTPOS cards. However, this move forcibly changes this in reverse. EFTPOS cards that were accessible via Visa have now been forced by Woolworths back to being EFTPOS cards.

I know, methods do update and change - we've seen AMEX cycle out, cheques no longer accepted and I can never find a 7/11 who will take gold doubloons for a Slurpee these days. But I'm not comfortable with a consumer outlet dictating the options made available to customers by their financial institutions.

My credit union provides Visa debit at no charge as compensation for their lack of accessible ATMs. We choose to do our banking with a credit union due to the ethical choices of that union, and take advantage of Visa debit to make up for the inconvenience this creates.

However, as Lifehacker Australia points out, there might be an easier solution for some:

If the only reason you’ve been using a debit card to pay your grocery bills is to avoid EFTPOS charges, switching banks to get more free EFTPOS transactions might be just as useful a strategy as switching supermarkets (especially if you end up travelling further in order to do that).

Regardless, it would seem my shopping days at Woolworths have come to an end. We use Visa debit, linked to our savings account, for nearly everything in day-to-day life, with the only exception being cash-bought fruit and veg from the market. We have the benefit of living in an area spoilt for supermarket choice, so it's easy to scratch Woolworths from the shopping list.

I did like this gem in the FAQ provided by Woolworths:

Q. My bank says I must always press Credit [CR].
A. Regardless of which button you press you still access your own bank account. You can still use your card to access these funds at Woolworth's.

I have a great image of someone standing at a checkout, furiously pressing the Credit button, to no avail. I do love an ambiguous non-answer in a FAQ.