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Sony should really stop with this whole $5 min to add to wallet bullshit.

Crispy

Member
$5 isn't so bad and is understandable I guess for transaction cost alone. I wanted to add some funds to my Nintendo account yesterday. Your choices go from 10, then 20, to 60 euro's! Nothing in between!
 

mattp

Member
they do allow exact payments though. there's just a minimum of $5
so as long as you're going over 5 bucks, it will be exact
 

ChrisD

Member
Reading all of the, "Not true," "is true," "nuh-uh," "uh-huh," is proof enough that there's a problem here lol.

I can't buy anything less than $5, even if my wallet is empty and I try to charge a Credit, Debit, or PayPal, without paying at least a $5 minimum. It's why I rarely buy small DLCs and stuff on my Sony platforms.
 
Is this a thing? I just bought something earlier today for £1.30 and I paid the exact amount. My balance was empty at the time as well

Yeah, same. I buy stuff under $5 all the time, with a zero balance in my wallet. It must vary by region or something.
 

mattp

Member
how is this any different than a brick & mortar store having a 5 dollar minimum on credit card purchases?

its really not that hard to understand
 

meirl

Banned
Agree. Its bullshit.

how is this any different than a brick & mortar store having a 5 dollar minimum on credit card purchases?

its really not that hard to understand

What is brick and mortar? What has this to do with PSN? On XBL you Can pay the exact amount.
 
People with the minimum problem: Are you using Mastercard or something else other than Visa?

I have this issue, and I'm wondering if it's linked to the card companies. Like, maybe Sony has a deal with Visa in exchange for doing their credit card through them.
 
People with the minimum problem: Are you using Mastercard?

I have this issue, and I'm wondering if it's linked to the card companies. Like, maybe Sony has a deal with Visa in exchange for doing their credit card through them.

I use a Mastercard and don't have this issue.
 
Valve won't let me add more than 100 € at a time to my Steam Account - I'm not in saving my credit card details anywhere for "convenience" so it bothers me to type them in all the time

Sony however blocks my EU country from signing up to PSN so I can't feel your pain with their digital storefront
 
I haven't had this problem on PSN for a while TBH.

$5 isn't so bad and is understandable I guess for transaction cost alone. I wanted to add some funds to my Nintendo account yesterday. Your choices go from 10, then 20, to 60 euro's! Nothing in between!

Holy shit, is this real? I've never bought anything digital on a Nintendo platform ever, so I had no idea.
 
And you can't even buy a single PS+ month from leftover. Only with credit card. From the PSN-wallet the minimum is the 3 months PS+ deal.

I don't see any reason behind it, except more money by being anti-consumer.
 

Htown

STOP SHITTING ON MY MOTHER'S HEADSTONE
This is probably what OP did and why people are confused:


Why did you add $5 to your wallet instead of just buying the game directly from the shop? That's your problem.

If you bought it from the shop directly it would have taken whatever is left in your wallet balance (presumably $0) then taken the rest from your account, which can be any amount over $5 ($5.32).

Since you added $5, now when you try to buy it from the shop it uses your wallet amount ($5) and the rest from your account, which has to be an amount over $5 (so charges $5).

You pay the exact amount for things if the purchase process would end up requiring you add $5+ to your wallet.

By adding money to your wallet on your own, you screwed yourself.

Go through the process procedure without money in your wallet and it'll end up prompting you to charge the exact amount.

Judging from your posts, the reason this didn't happen is because you'd already charged $5 to your wallet. This means you need to charge a few cents to cover taxes. Since you can only charge a minimum of $5, you have to charge $5 to cover those cents.

If you'd had nothing in your wallet, you would've been prompted to charge the exact amount instead.

Edit: A probable reason for the minimum fund limit is credit card transaction fees. Every time they make a transaction, they have to pay a fee and if the charge is too small that fee can be too large a percentage of the cut to be worth it. Because of this, many companies will enforce a minimum charge.

Adding $5 to the wallet first is where the fuck up happened. That $5 transaction has already happened. Now OP needs 32 cents for the game. But obviously, there's a $5 minimum for a transaction. Hence he'll need to do an additional $5 transaction now.

Basically, lesson learned the hard way OP (which is still not so bad seeing as it's not like those $5 are gone altogether). Next time you have something $9.68 or above to buy, you'll be able to pay exact. And then from that point onwards, just don't add credit to your wallet manually by yourself, the system will automatically do that when you do a checkout. It'll either add $5 if the transaction is under $5, or pay the exact amount without any funds left over in your wallet.

That... makes sense though? In moving money from your credit card to your wallet, they have to move a minimum $5. So in buying a thing that costs more than you have in your wallet, they have to move a minimum $5. So they move the $5, charge the $5.32 on the $10 on your wallet, and you're left with $4.68 in your wallet.

Am I crazy?



Nope nevermind beaten.

Like, y'all realize that's a dumbass way to run your digital store, right?
 

bitbydeath

Member
What? How did you draw that conclusion?

Correlation = / = causation, as in, it's clearly not that simple.

Well that is not the case everywhere, it's like how some smaller shops enforce a minimum for their cards while others do not.

Meaning it is not introduced from the top, just something implemented at the base (the US, and apparently France)
 

Bulby

Member
I bought the witcher 3 on sale last week. Had 23 in my wallet from a gift card. Got to the check out and it said 23 + 2 euro. Clicked buy and it took 5 euro out of my account so now i have 3 euro in my wallet. Go figure. This is in Germany
 

Beartruck

Member
I was 35 cents short on buying wonderboy for switch because of tax, and nintendo let me use a card for that exact amount. When freakin Nintendo is beating you in an online feature you need to step back and figure out how to fix that.
 

ianpm31

Member
Well if they did that and somebody wanted to buy a .50 cent avatar then Sony would be taking a loss due to credit card companies charging a service fee.
 
I don't disagree with what OP is saying but is this really that big of a deal? How often are you buying things under $5? and if you are then you are using the leftovers right away anyways. And if you aren't then who cares if you are out $2 until you need to buy something else from PSN. IT'S $2. If having $2 waiting on your PSN account is an issue then maybe you shouldn't be spending the original $3 to begin with.
 
I don't disagree with what OP is saying but is this really that big of a deal? How often are you buying things under $5? and if you are then you are using the leftovers right away anyways. And if you aren't then who cares if you are out $2 until you need to buy something else from PSN. IT'S $2. If having $2 waiting on your PSN account is an issue then maybe you shouldn't be spending the original $3 to begin with.

Well, I do. I buy a lot of PS2 classics and heavily discounted games. I also once had a problem where I got double charged for a $5 game and I don't exactly like randomly spending $10 instead of $5. So now I use Amazon PSN cards for more expensive games....and guess what I have to do if a game is $23.

I'm less concerned about the 'lost' $3 and more getting charged $10 at complete random.
 
It's definitely real, Playstation Store won't let me buy anything under $5 without adding a minimum of $5 to my wallet, but anything over $5, even $0.01, it will just charge the exact amount from my card. Sometimes with flash sales I'll throw in a theme or two so that I'm over $5 and don't have to add extra.
 
I haven't had this problem on PSN for a while TBH.



Holy shit, is this real? I've never bought anything digital on a Nintendo platform ever, so I had no idea.

I don't think Nintendo let's you charge directly to your cc card, only to add funds to your account. Not only that I think the they don't even have a universal account system. My 3ds and Switch has different accounts that you have to link together.
 

yyr

Member
Credit card fees consist of TWO portions, added together:

1) A flat fee
2) A percentage of the transaction amount

Credit card transaction fees are generally looked at as "the cost of doing business." But because the flat fee is there, charging very small amounts (for example, a few dollars) causes the fee to be a significantly larger portion of the amount paid, which cuts into the profit margin.

Recall that Sony (and Valve, and Microsoft, etc.) is running a digital marketplace where they sell a lot of third-party goods. They've promised those third parties a certain % of the purchase price. So if a larger % of the purchase price goes towards credit-card fees, that's all coming out of Sony's pocket.

Hence, the minimums. It makes sense when you think about it.

This is also why you should use cash when paying small amounts (like, under $5). If you go to a local store and buy a newspaper, or a cheap food item, or something else where both the price and profit margins are very low, and then charge it, the store might be paying more in credit card fees than they're making off the transaction...which is why many stores post credit card minimums.

But also, think about where the money is going. Some folks complain about income inequality, and how huge banks and businesses (and their investors) rake in money hand over fist, and how consumers and local businesses are left with the scraps. If you charge everything on your credit card, especially sub-$5 amounts, you are part of the problem, because a portion of every transaction is going not to your local businesses, but to a huge bank or corporation that doesn't particularly need the money. Those redirected fees literally add up to billions of dollars.

For some perspective: during just the 3rd quarter of 2016, MasterCard made a profit of $1.18 billion on revenues of $2.88 billion. And that's just on a small portion of the fees collected using cards with the MasterCard logo on them. The majority of the fees go to the banks that issued the cards.

So yeah. Sony's minimums are there to reduce what they lose from credit card transactions. I'd do the same thing if I were them.
 

EGM1966

Member
Ignoring regions variations (that may or may not exist I don't know) isn't the issue topping up the wallet vs buying directly?

I always just buy direct (and have for a while) and it takes exact amount everytime. But if you go to to up wallet first you can only add in increments of 5?

That seems to be UK anyway and once I treasured this many years ago I skipped tipping up wallet and just bought directly.

Of course perhaps other regions are different.
 

Falchion

Member
Yep it's stupid and I hate having the extra money just sitting in my account until the next time I buy something and the process repeats. I much prefer the Xbox store.
 
No. In his case it works like this:

if $0 in wallet: product costs $5.32 and he can charge exact amount, because this charge is larger than $5

if $5 in wallet: product costs $5.32, the wallet covers $5 and he needs 32 cents. The purchase process will not allow him to make a charge lower than $5, meaning he has to spend $5 to get the necessary 32 cents.

Edit: The moral of the story is don't pre-charge your wallet. And maybe hope you're able to avoid the minimum charge.

Yea, just tested this. Put $5 in my wallet. Tried to buy something for $7.49. At checkout, it only took $2.49 from my wallet and charged another $5 to my card, leaving $2.51 in my wallet. Really dumb way to do things.
 
Well that is not the case everywhere, it's like how some smaller shops enforce a minimum for their cards while others do not.

Meaning it is not introduced from the top, just something implemented at the base (the US, and apparently France)

Of course not, but that doesn't mean it's not Sony's fault that it's like that. There are obviously country dependent factors that influence how these systems are set up, but don't act like it's out of Sony's hand to change them.

I'm sure there are plenty of other companies operating in those countries without a minimum charge.
 

FC Bayern

Member
OP messed up.

But this is something that Nintendo did with their Wii points...

Let you buy them in certain increments (think in lots of 500 or something) and priced games at 800/1200/1600 etc.
 

dex3108

Member
Sony should learn that there are much more countries in the world than they are currently supporting. I had to create account with fake country and address and I need to use PSN cards from 3rd party sellers to add funds to wallet so I can buy things from PSN.
 

madjoki

Member

Steam $5 min is only when you add to wallet, direct payments don't have any limit.

Game purchases on Steam do not have limit.

Even stupid things like $x.98 from wallet and $0.01 from card for $x.99 is allowed.

From what I read above Sony always makes it min $5, so if you buy game $3, you pay $5 and get $2 to wallet, next time you buy $3 game and again pay $5. (and getting $4 left to wallet).

Valve won't let me add more than 100 € at a time to my Steam Account - I'm not in saving my credit card details anywhere for "convenience" so it bothers me to type them in all the time

This is just Valve's UI limit and can be bypassed:

You can actually use something like Enhanced Steam to add any amount 5€ - 450€ (450€ is max you can have in wallet).

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=328859255
 
Yea, just tested this. Put $5 in my wallet. Tried to buy something for $7.49. At checkout, it only took $2.49 from my wallet and charged another $5 to my card, leaving $2.51 in my wallet. Really dumb way to do things.

If you had bout it with a zero balance it would have been exact 7.49 . You done screwed the pooch.
 

rpmurphy

Member
Credit card fees consist of TWO portions, added together:

1) A flat fee
2) A percentage of the transaction amount

Credit card transaction fees are generally looked at as "the cost of doing business." But because the flat fee is there, charging very small amounts (for example, a few dollars) causes the fee to be a significantly larger portion of the amount paid, which cuts into the profit margin.

Recall that Sony (and Valve, and Microsoft, etc.) is running a digital marketplace where they sell a lot of third-party goods. They've promised those third parties a certain % of the purchase price. So if a larger % of the purchase price goes towards credit-card fees, that's all coming out of Sony's pocket.

Hence, the minimums. It makes sense when you think about it.

This is also why you should use cash when paying small amounts (like, under $5). If you go to a local store and buy a newspaper, or a cheap food item, or something else where both the price and profit margins are very low, and then charge it, the store might be paying more in credit card fees than they're making off the transaction...which is why many stores post credit card minimums.

But also, think about where the money is going. Some folks complain about income inequality, and how huge banks and businesses (and their investors) rake in money hand over fist, and how consumers and local businesses are left with the scraps. If you charge everything on your credit card, especially sub-$5 amounts, you are part of the problem, because a portion of every transaction is going not to your local businesses, but to a huge bank or corporation that doesn't particularly need the money. Those redirected fees literally add up to billions of dollars.

For some perspective: during just the 3rd quarter of 2016, MasterCard made a profit of $1.18 billion on revenues of $2.88 billion. And that's just on a small portion of the fees collected using cards with the MasterCard logo on them. The majority of the fees go to the banks that issued the cards.

So yeah. Sony's minimums are there to reduce what they lose from credit card transactions. I'd do the same thing if I were them.
It's not that I don't understand the rationale behind it. But like the local stores that have, for example, a $10 minimum requirement to use a credit card, I'll just shop somewhere else that doesn't have that policy. I have my doubts that between small and large purchases on their digital store by their large userbase, that Sony's video game division cannot absorb the cost of the extra credit card transaction fees.
 

Htown

STOP SHITTING ON MY MOTHER'S HEADSTONE
No, it isn't.

The minimum transaction is $5.00. You could have spent $7.49 in one transaction, if you wanted.

I explain above why Sony made this decision.

It's really dumb.

If they have $5 in their wallet, and the total amount is $7.49, the correct thing to do is take 5 from the wallet and 2.49 from the card.

Sony is not some tiny mom-and-pop shop that is going to go out of business due to credit card charges of under 5 bucks. Or are we suggesting that Sony can't figure out how to do this, when other digital distribution storefronts manage it just fine?
 
I always use prepaid-cards. Where is the problem in having 3-4€ of spare-money in your psn-account for the next purchase? Seriously, this is a total non-issue.
 

Dork94

Neo Member
In Australia, the minimum (for me, anyway) is $10. I constantly run into this issue renting movies on PlayStation Video - if the movie is $6 to rent, and I have $4 left from last time, I have to put on $10 more. It's bullshit.

I also find it very annoying when so many people on here jump in and assert the minimum is $5 - not everyone lives in America.
 
Sony is the only company I've ever come across that does the wallet nonsense. I was negatively surprised when I noticed it's still a thing on PS4. It is bad and they should've stopped years ago.
 
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