laundry payment question

MOST places we've gone to do laundry will take credit/debit cards for CASH but usually NOT for services. I mean you get the case and THEN put the money into the slots not using the card to pay them directly. SOME places have attendants to do the transaction and some use a debit/credit change machine where you put in the amount you want then swipe your card. You should KNOW how your particular card treats that kind of transaction. SOME of the rip off cards will call it a "Cash Advance" so if yours does this be sure you don't carry a balance on it.

When we wintered at a 'resort', the common practice was to give your card to a friend or neighbor when you leave. I think most short-stay RV parks still use quarters. If not, I would go to a local laundromat, instead.

AprilWhine wrote:
Better idea is to do what Canada did, eliminate the penny and the paper dollar. It was so much easier to use two dollar coins to do the wash, instead of ten pounds of quarters!

Better idea, is to make machines that take dollar bills, like vending machines do & get rid of the heavy $2 coins & ten pounds of quarters.
Isn't that why we did away with Silver dollars & 50 cent pieces in the first place? :h

Bravo JJBIRISH...that was priceless!:B

Fabulous idea...swindlers!

The cards are a money maker for the laundry… especially in vacation and destination areas… a deposit for the card, lost money left on the card, less maintenance than on coin chute mechanisms… and yes they will load $22 for $20 cost…

In these transient areas the deposit on the unreturned cards is a big profit center alone… the returned cards value is not refunded and the card deposited mailed but somehow they get lost in the mail…
The un-refunded money left on the returned cards is more often than not used by the laundry itself that does customer laundry by the pound doubling its worth of the un-refunded money…

It might be a good system when run right, but my experience with them is they are used by greedy little thieves swindling anybody they can, any way they can…

the one in Estero refused to refund the value saying it was policy even though it’s not posted… so I used my cards to pay for everybody in the place laundry before returning the cards, and they had the nerve to call the cops on me for doing it and said I had to leave… so I left when they asked and when people from the public parking lot came I gave them a card to use to load their washer, and waited for the police that they called… that was comical as he!!, Six cars and seven sheriffs show up because I was paying for others peoples laundry…

these are in-house prepaid cards… not credit or debit cards…

Better idea is to do what Canada did, eliminate the penny and the paper dollar. It was so much easier to use two dollar coins to do the wash, instead of ten pounds of quarters!

wborst, they would have to jack the prices most likely as credit card
fees would add to this not very pricey expense...ditto on debit cards.
Thanks for sharing.
Donna

I don't understand why laundromats have not gone to credit card operated machines. If gas stations can do this, why not a laundromat?

:h

When I worked in a laundry mat back in 1980, it was only about $1 to wash and 25 cents got you about 15 minutes with a large dryer. So it was practical to use a roll of 40 quarters, or buy a few from the dollar changer to do a whole week's worth of laundry at once.

Nowdays, with the cost being over $20 to get a few large loads of laundry done, and spend 30 minutes on the larger commercial dryers, it is much more practical to have coinless laundry systems. They can offer the following advantages.

Lower costs on special days (so on a slow Wednesday or Thursday, they can offer special pricing, like reducing the cost by $0.50 per load, or give a extra minute of dryer time per $0.25 cost).

Offer a card recharge value of $22.00 when you use a $20 bill to refill the card (so 10% free) was offered at the laundry mat I used to use.

Make it much easier to keep track of your income (if you own the laundry)

Keep the shopkeeper(s) down the street from bringing over $10 and empty your quarter changer for their own use. Running out of quarters can be a problem in some laundry mats, I have seen signs that say "Customer use only".

Prevents the need to have each machine emptied each day.

I was reading a "Laundry" owners magazine when I collected most of this information about a laundry mat. I do not own one.

Fred.

We have found that the quarters are still used in most places.
Some "resorts" in AZ use the cards.What bothers me is that you usualy have some
value left on the card when you leave,being as you load the card $5 at a time,and you may only need $1 to finish the dry cycle.
We really dislike the darned things!