Naive question: why bother with MasterCard and Discover?

[Anonymous]

They seem (at least to me) to be the least-accepted amongst the four majors, although I could be wrong. Why do you have them in your wallet?

[Anonymous]

Mastercard should be just as accepted as VISA.  Haven't noticed any real places that accept VISA and not MC.  As for Discover, I find it accepted about the same as AMEX.  AMEX has some unique coverage, but I find places have Visa/MC/Discover before Visa/MC/Amex.

[Anonymous]

Actually, there have been a few times recently where Visa, specifically, was NOT accepted; such as my online payment for tag registration...

[laboi_22]

I have never not been able to use Visa anywhere yet. I agree though. I have a MasterCard but I never use it and I find it just as accepted as Visa.

My experience with Discover in my area is that it's less accepted than AMEX. I was shocked when several local merchants didn't take my Discover but I asked about AMEX and they said yes. Can you imagine AMEX as a back up. I was actually thinking about posting about this since I tried to use my Discover more but now I'm back to all Visa and AMEX. When I asked these local merchants they said it was more expensive to accept Discover than AMEX. I highly doubt it.

[TNTransplant]

Yep, same thing here.  Visa/MC seem pretty much universally accepted, with Amex next, and Discover bringing up the rear.

I was surprised at how many places took Amex, though - have already been able to hit my "spend $1000 in the first three months and get $150 statement credit" on my BCP, and I've only had it for 2 weeks.  

Interestingly enough, I made vacation arrangements for later this year, and planned to also charge that to AMEX - nothing doing, as they only accepted Visa/MC/Discover.  Oh well, I finally got to use my Discover card for the first time.  

[Datx]

My Discover More card has been my primary card the last month or so, and I only found one restaurant that did not take Discover cards. My backup is a Visa card which they gladly accepted.

[BrokaToe]

I was in Sams Club store the other evening, and they were unable to accept Visa.  They could accept a Visa logo on a debit card, but not credit card.  They do accept MC though.  Just thought that was strange.

[laboi_22]

Yep Sams is strange. They only accept Discover, MasterCard and Visa (debit cards only). Strange situation.

[Anonymous]

I use discover and Amex most, and I've been to 2 diff places that didn't accept one or the other. Both are pretty much accepted at 99% of the places I go

[Anonymous]

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@BrokaToe wrote:

I was in Sams Club store the other evening, and they were unable to accept Visa.  They could accept a Visa logo on a debit card, but not credit card.  They do accept MC though.  Just thought that was strange.

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http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/Credit-Cards/Sam-s-Club-doesn-t-accept-Visa-credit-cards/m-p/1163753...