With Discover not being accepted everywhere...

[Carloscda40]

Now that Capital One has aquired Discover will the debit and credit cards be accepted where Discover is not?

[FicoMike0]

I doubt that Capone will be able to increase the acceptance of discover. I expect they will move some cards to the disco network. They presently have both mc and visa. You won't see venture X moving. They could push some cobrand card there if the partner already accepts disco.

[crystal626]

Debit cards are typically accepted no matter the network in the US. I can use my PayPal debit MasterCard at Costco, for example. As long as it's a PIN debit, you are good. Discover credit cards are also accepted most places, just some merchants either mistakenly believe they can't take it or they think the fees are too high.

I doubt that Capital One will ink the agreements they need to increase international acceptance of Discover though.

[sto0pyd]

I actually think that Capital One will have enough influence to increase the acceptance rate of Discover cards since they are now the largest card issuer. 

[FicoMike0]

I have used a mc debit at Costco, but I think my amex debit failed. I'll have to try again to verify.

[CYBERSAM]

The only reason that Discover is not accepted everywhere is because it has higher merchant fee then Visa/MC. CapOne can make that the same fee and everyone would include Discover. Not including international.

[Debt-is-a-Scam]

I think this will depend heavily on each individual credit card product they issue out. At this point in time, who knows?

[dfwxjer]

---

@FicoMike0 wrote:

I have used a mc debit at Costco, but I think my amex debit failed. I'll have to try again to verify.

---

Debit runs on different payment rails than Visa/MC/Amex/Disc so the Cap1/Discover debit card will work at Costco and any other merchant that is setup for the Pulse network. Amex has their own debit network which is why they don't work at Costco. 

[askmrlee]

This is unfortunately not true. The new Capital One Discover network based debit card simply does not work at Costco US even as a PIN based ATM card. The terminal rejects the card with a cryptic "PIN PAD error" message. I tried this last week to buy a simple hot dog at the food court - no go. 

[askmrlee]

This is not a universal rule that Discover is always more expensive to accept than MC/Visa or even Amex - the merchant fee highly depends on the individual processor's rates. For example if you accept through Square or Paypal the rate is the same for all cards - Amex, MC, Visa and Discover. Other processors have a complex matrix that depends on the card type with premium cards such as Visa Infinite (such as Chase Sapphire Reserve) and Mastercard World Elite can have a higher rate than even American Express.