Thailand launches Visa Destinations nationwide

Anthony Watson, Visa Thailand's country manager, said the programme would help Thai merchants of all sizes gain more value from spending by international visitors, while making transactions more seamless and trusted for both customers and businesses.

How nice. Now, what are the fees/charges etc?

The article fails to say exactly what it is - i.e.;

A physical card or an AP

How is it obtained

Who is eligible

Any cost(s)

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by scottiejohn

8 minutes ago, scottiejohn said:

The article fails to say exactly what it is - i.e.;

A physical card or an AP

How is it obtained

Who is eligible

Any cost(s)

It's basically nothing at all. Explained here....Visa Destinations: Discover https://share.google/9RMXzLPlqZTXdE0rE

3 hours ago, Georgealbert said:

For expats, retirees and frequent visitors, the practical benefit will depend on how quickly local outlets take up the payment facilities.

Great. Will paying visa VISA card still be optional? If so, no problem for the boo-birds.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by JerryM

27 minutes ago, scottiejohn said:

The article fails to say exactly what it is - i.e.;

A physical card or an AP

How is it obtained

Who is eligible

Any cost(s)

You can just send people money nowadays as well refunds, realtime, based on the visa card number. For merchants the lowest possible fee is 1%. It's quite a joke as in reality visa and mastercard both are the same blackrock owned <deleted>e and they also now somehow charge 350 baht fee on ATM withdrawals using a mastercard debit card, while its still the usual 250 on visa.

Not sure the logic with all this, as you need to share your visa card number with strangers, all they need is a expiry date and 3 numbers to crack it. Best guess some easy to use QR scan thing doing effectively the same by scanning or whatever.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by sunrisecoconuts

5 minutes ago, sunrisecoconuts said:

It's quite a joke as in reality visa and mastercard both are the same blackrock owned

Ownership

Visa is mainly owned by institutional investors, who own over 95% of shares. The largest shareholders in December 2023 were:

The Vanguard Group (8.94%)

BlackRock (7.99%)

State Street Corporation (4.64%)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_Inc.

2 minutes ago, JerryM said:

Ownership

Visa is mainly owned by institutional investors, who own over 95% of shares. The largest shareholders in December 2023 were:

The Vanguard Group (8.94%)

BlackRock (7.99%)

State Street Corporation (4.64%)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_Inc.

Yeah except that only 10% of people is able or is using their voting right, on those company shares, which means Larry Fink controls 90% of the voting rights, over all that capital, in all companies, AKA he makes the decisions with his palls.

You do not need to own the shares or money in your name, to have the power and control over shares or money. The power and control is what generates abundant recurring income for the elite. They not depend on a 'net worth figure'.

Edited 1 hour ago1 hr by sunrisecoconuts

11 minutes ago, sunrisecoconuts said:

Yeah except that only 10% of people is able or is using their voting right, on those company shares, which means Larry Fink controls 90% of the voting rights, over all that capital, in all companies, AKA he makes the decisions with his palls.

So Larry Fink is able to vote 90% of Black Rock's 8% ownership of VISA.

So what. If you don't want to use VISA in Thailand then don't.

Edited 46 minutes ago46 min by JerryM

These things always start out as being for the conveninece of the people. For now, cash is still accepted. But the next (obvious) step is for them to say, "This works so well, we don't need to bother with cash anymore." Since IKEA at Mega BangNa stopped accepting cash last year, I have stopped buying from them. How can it even be legal not to accept a country's currency at a shop? I will resist for as long as I can.

11 minutes ago, JerryM said:

So Larry Fink is able to vote 90% of Black Rock's 8% ownership of VISA.

So what. If you don't want to use VISA in Thailand then don't.

Larry Fink is just 1 of very few people, that run all the funds, but keep your head in the mud, maybe go a bit deeper. It is not a conspiracy, these are the facts, in fact Larry Fink was under a large pressure since recent years already exactly for this.

Same that the facts are that this is how elites globally, make their money since generations, over centuries even. That is why there is no simple proven 'highest net worth rotschild elite' that peasants wanted to see for it to be proof a elite runs the show.

The mindfk is that peasants depend on money, the elite depends on controlling resources and infrastructure / banking.

Edited 34 minutes ago34 min by sunrisecoconuts

4 hours ago, Georgealbert said:

Cash will remain useful in many settings, but the initiative is designed to reduce the need for visitors to rely solely on banknotes when travelling beyond major shopping centres and hotel areas.

But still they are insisting on a 20,000-40,000baht cash flash as an entry requirement!

11 minutes ago, sunrisecoconuts said:

Larry Fink is just 1 of very few people, that run all the funds, but keep your head in the mud, maybe go a bit deeper

Thank you. Sometimes it is convenient for me to use a VISA card at BigC. As far as this topic goes, that is suffficient.

4 hours ago, Georgealbert said:

Bringing smaller businesses into digital payments

The scheme is based on four elements: payment innovation; information from Visa's global VisaNet network; partnerships across the tourism sector; and increasing the number of merchants able to accept digital payments.

Visa has already enrolled more than 50 merchants in Bangkok's historic Song Wat riverside district. It aims to extend digital-payment acceptance to 56,000 small businesses nationwide.

Visa to start harvesting the revenues of small business which can least afford the transaction costs. Why would a business go to credit cards when locally PromptPay with a QR code works and I believe has no transaction charges in most cases or minimal transaction charges.j

From Grok AI:
Examples of common U.S. Visa interchange rates (effective as of April 2026 updates; these are reimbursement fees to issuers):

(usa.visa.com)

• Retail credit (standard in-person): Often around 1.43%–2.30% + $0.10.

• Supermarket: Lower, e.g., 1.15%–2.00% + $0.05–$0.07.

• Rewards/Signature cards: Higher, e.g., up to 2.10%–2.60% + $0.10.

• Small-ticket: Often 1.90%–2.20% (with minimums like $0.04).

• Debit (regulated/PIN): Much lower, e.g., 0.05% + $0.21 (capped in some cases).

• Card-not-present (e-commerce): Higher, e.g., 1.65%–1.90% + $0.10–$0.25 or more.

Why would a small retailer want to go with a model that skims more money off the top, ie, Visa?

3 minutes ago, connda said:

Visa to start harvesting the revenues of small business which can least afford the transaction costs. Why would a business go to credit cards when locally PromptPay with a QR code works and I believe has no transaction charges in most cases or minimal transaction charges.j

Why would a small retailer want to go with a model that skims more money off the top, ie, Visa?

Per the OP, the program is aimed at temporary travelers and,in theory, they would be more prone to shopping with smaller entities than if they had to use cash.

The scheme is based on four elements: payment innovation; information from Visa's global VisaNet network; partnerships across the tourism sector; and increasing the number of merchants able to accept digital payments.

For expats and retirees, it's probably cheaper and easier to use PromptPay. Pretty much everywhere here. Just scan and go.

I send my monthly pension via Transferwise, then use my phone to pay.

I often see signs in shops and restaurants saying htere will be a 3% surcharge for credit cards. These US card companies will likely all be taking a cut for these new schemes, and collecting, collating, and exchanging even more personal information.

Also trying to get in before China's payment systems take over Asia.