Chevron responds to complaint about minimum charge enforcement in one of their stores...

Our letter to Chevron (which details the incident that took place earlier this week):

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing on behalf of NoMinimumCharge.com, a consumer protection website.

It has come to my attention while shopping at a local Chevron station that your retail store is enforcing a disallowed policy in regard to credit card transactions.

While making a purchase today, I was told that I could not make a $4.30 purchase with any credit card except for a Chevron card; there was a $10 minimum purchase amount. Your contract with Visa/MasterCard strictly forbids any sort of minimum or maximum credit card transaction amount and violations are grounds for termination of your station's contract with Visa or MasterCard.

I would like to formally request that you ban such practices in your stations. The manager at the station I visited, at 304 Arlington Ave in Kensington, CA, very grudgingly completed the transaction and is going to continue enforcing this policy to consumers who know no better.

Thank you for your attention to this message.

Fast forward several days later and Chevron responds to the message:

Thank you for taking the time to contact Chevron regarding your visit to your local Chevron retailer located at 304 ARLINGTON AVE in KENSINGTON, CA.

We sent your comments to the retailer that owns and operates this station to make him aware of the incident so that he can take corrective action.  We know that as a business owner who values customer goodwill, he will counsel his station management to ensure that this does not happen again.

Chevron is committed to providing excellent products and services to our customers, and when this does not happen we are very disappointed.  It is very difficult to be knowledgeable of all events at all stations, however, customers such as you enable us to take corrective action when we are able.

Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention.  We apologize for the inconvenience that it caused.

Contrary to the incident that you described, we sincerely value you as a customer and hope this incident will not keep you from patronizing stations in our retail network in the future.

Whether or not the owner talks to the manager about these practices is unknown. The response didn't specifically address or quote the issue at hand. We have no immediate plans to revisit this Chevron station, so it may be a while before we find out whether or not the policy is still being enforced. One thing that was left out on the initial contact with Chevron is that there was a sign posted behind the counter stating this policy.

Beginnings... read this first!

When retailers choose to accept credit cards, they are accepting in their vendor agreement with Visa or Mastercard that they must not enfore a minimum purchase amount to complete a transaction. While we can't cite the actual verbiage from a contract (the contracts are somewhat difficult to track down online), the MasterCard website has an option called "In order to make a MasterCard purchase, the merchant/retailer required a minimum or maximum amount" on their online complaint form. Visa has the same policy with vendors, but the only way to complain is by calling them.

If a retailer posts a sign saying something to the effect of "X$ minimum for credit card purchases" and then tries to enforce this policy, you are being cheated by the retailer. To help resolve the situation:

1. Politely inform the retailer that they are not allowed to do this.
2. If the retailer insists it is their policy, (again, politely) explain to them that their vendor agreement with Visa/MC forbids such practices.

It is usually after step 2 that retailers will back off and honor the transaction. This is especially essential if you're in a restaurant. If they're insistent upon enforcing their disallowed policy, there's not a whole lot you can do if you've already consumed what you're about to pay for. In a small store, you can insist that you will take your business elsewhere. You have the choice to shop there, and they have the choice to honor policy. If they honor policy, you'll shop there. If not, you can take your business elsewhere and inform them accordingly.

The key is to *be nice* about all of this. We don't necessarily encourage reporting these issues to Visa/MC unless you are actually refused the sale.

Vendors have good reason to want to enforce a minimum charge amount; they are charged a $0.25 to $0.50 transaction fee and then a 1-5% fee on all credit card transactions. It adds up for a retailer. This is not, however an excuse to violate contract and refuse small sales based on this. It's part of the cost of doing business, and if retailers can't handle this cost, they should not be accepting credit cards.

If you are refused a sale and you need to report it to Visa or MasterCard, you can phone Visa at 1-800-VISA-911 or log the complaint on MasterCard's website, here.