U.S. retailers face charges for food stamp machines

[KamaAina]

http://www.sacbee.com/news/business/article3359249.html

The U.S. Department of Agriculture used to pay for the “point-of-service” devices used by some retailers specifically to swipe EBT cards, but the machines will now come at a cost.

The elimination of the free EBT equipment program in all states is a result of the February passage of the Agricultural Act of 2014. Retailers using a government-issued machine could continue doing so for free until Sept. 21, at which point they were instructed to arrange payment for EBT services through a third-party processor....

Retailers’ other options include adding EBT processing to the debit/credit card device, as some larger grocery stores do, or terminating EBT service altogether.

The latter is not an option for Paul Singh, owner of Pacific Market in midtown, who said EBT users make up 30 percent to 40 percent of his customer base. He began paying the $75 fee this month, and said it’s a hard hit on top of already rising food prices. Singh is prohibited by SNAP regulations from charging additional processing fees to an EBT customer.

Great! Make it harder to feed poor people so Xerox can get richer!

[grasswire]

1. gotta monetize everything possible

drain the treasury, transfer it all to the corporations!

What's next? Limiting food purchases to "approved" brands?

[ladyVet]

2. Don't give anybody any ideas!

There are already folks who think SNAP users shouldn't be able to buy certain types of foods. (Some of them are on this forum.) Going brand-specific might sound like a good idea.

[xfundy]

3. "approved" brands? They already do.

Certain items have a WIC sign next to them. In the time I've been noticing these items, I've never noticed one for a store brand or any smaller brand than the big ones.

[grasswire]

4. you may be right...

....although are mothers able to buy another brand if they so choose? I don't know anything about how that works.

[Recursion]

5. It varies by state, but generally not

I was on WIC as a kid and back then you got a literal box of food (shelf stable milk, cheese, etc.). Now you get (at least in MS and DC) a little booklet of coupons that are for specific items in grocery stores (eg, the cheapest type of a certain brand of juice, even if that's tomato juice... sorry, kid, no OJ).

Your idea would make a lot more sense (give the mom $1.50 towards any juice and she can cover the rest). The issue is that like the rest of nutrition assistance it's actually a subsidy for food producers, not just poor people.

[daredtowork]

6. What the HELL???!!!!!

How do GOP pinheads manage to slip this stuff in? The implications for justifying the "zoning" of the poor should be obvious!!!!

Just this weekend I tried to get some groceries in at Piedmont Grocery on the ritzy gentrified Piedmont Avenue in Oakland - that just happened to be where I was, and I wanted to pick up some food before I went home. The Point of Sale machine took my EBT card, so I saw that it was technically possible for Piedmont Grocery to process the EBT card. But then the check out girl stopped me - Piedmont Grocery "doesn't take" EBT cards. Any 10 foot corner grocery can take my EBT card, but not Piedmont Grocery. Could it be because Piedmont Grocery is trying to keep the "type" of people who use EBT cards out of the neighborhood?

Once Point-of-Sale machines aren't free, that will just become one more excuse not to take EBT cards, enabling store owners to disguise racism and other attempts to Disneyfy their neighborhood while trapping all the poor people in a "poor" part of town without access to basic goods and services.

[Separation]

7. It fucking drives me crazy

You hear people saying, "those mooching, freeloading, good for nothing people", "always getting free handouts from the government." I then ask them who is a bigger moocher, a person struggling to feed their family and maybe receiving if they are lucky $700. Or banks, investors, and corporations who receive multiple millions of dollars in tax breaks and bailouts. The smarter of the dumbfucks normally shut up, the more Faux indoctrinated try to come back with arguments that are easily broken down and torn apart. If they want to find moochers and freeloaders they need to look at the guys wearing suits.