Peter wrote:
I (…) rapidly concluded that some large %, possibly the vast majority, of the map is fiction.
What is fiction? Do they list in blue or green airports where one can’t pay with AeroPS? Does their API fail to give price information for airports in grey? What is the fiction? For airports in grey, all it says is that AeroPS will give price estimates. This could be done (and might be done by AeroPS that way) wholly without support from the airport, just by encoding the rules published in their public “charges” PDF.
Maestro is not the only debit card system
Of course, but the objective here is to present data which is relevant to whether the pilot (holding card(s) x y z) is able to pay at the said airport. To establish this, it is not necessary to list every possible card. One merely needs to cover the main classes of cards.
Probably less important today than 10 years ago, since due to EU security measures like PCI-DSS (which is a poorly implemented absolute nightmare for any small business) most small businesses are using 3rd party payment processors which accept practically all cards – possibly except AMEX.
This could be done (and might be done by AeroPS that way) wholly without support from the airport, just by encoding the rules published in their public “charges” PDF.
If some large % of airports do not participate, what is then the long term business plan for this initiative? Any pilot who actually cares about the cost of the fuel at a particular destination (and most don’t) can find a price list on the airport’s website, which is likely to be more current than data presented in some app. If an airport doesn’t actively participate, there is no assurance that any data presented is current.
The reason I am questioning this is because it would cost time (money) to implement, and there are so many business initiatives which set out to skim a percentage off aviation activity e.g. Myhandling which AFAICT is hated by everybody who actually flies 
Peter wrote:
Maestro is not the only debit card systemOf course, but the objective here is to present data which is relevant to whether the pilot (holding card(s) x y z) is able to pay at the said airport.
I was only reacting to Sebastian_H’s insistence that “debit card” and “maestro” are synonymous, not suggesting that many different types should be listed separately. A single choice “debit card” should be OK, and then one can mostly safely assume “it will take all types of debit cards commonly accepted in this European country”. But listing only Maestro (and not “V Pay” and CB), in my opinion, does not make sense.
Peter wrote:
If some large % of airports do not participate, what is then the long term business plan for this initiative?
Obviously their long term business plan is that that a sizeable number (not %-age) of airports participate, or maybe a sizeable %-age within some area like “Germany”. Frankly, in Germany, they seem to have decent coverage.
Indeed, I don’t think that fuel prices will be reliable in the least for non-participating airports. But landing/parking prices tend to change more rarely (like once per year), so having someone type them in without participation by the airport makes much more sense… My guess for the business reason for AeroPS to do that is:
I express no opinion on whether it is worth the investment for the EuroGA airports database to query that API.
@lionel wrote:
I was only reacting to Sebastian_H’s insistence that “debit card” and “maestro” are synonymous, not suggesting that many different types should be listed separately. A single choice “debit card” should be OK, and then one can mostly safely assume “it will take all types of debit cards commonly accepted in this European country”. But listing only Maestro (and not “V Pay” and CB), in my opinion, does not make sense.
I’ve had bad experiences in Germany not accepting my debit card because it is a Mastercard (MasterCard Debit, not Maestro), while they were accepting other local debit cards. I think cards should be listed separately.
Dimme wrote:
not accepting my debit card
My father has American Express, which some places refuse to accept because the merchant has to pay a much higher percentage fee. The worst was in France 10-20 years ago where the restaurant would swipe the card upside down, or too slowly, then pretend it wasn’t working
Capitaine wrote:
My father has American Express, which some places refuse to accept because the merchant has to pay a much higher percentage fee.
In Sweden virtually every merchant accepts credit cards, but only of the Visa/MasterCharge varieties, seldom American Express..
American Express mainly decided to withdraw from EU due to cost of compliance, so I doubt we’ll see their cards issued in EU. However, the acceptance will remain but I guess transaction processing will be more expensive and merchants will slowly start to avoid it.
lionel wrote:
I was only reacting to Sebastian_H’s insistence that “debit card” and “maestro” are synonymous, not suggesting that many different types should be listed separately. A single choice “debit card” should be OK, and then one can mostly safely assume “it will take all types of debit cards commonly accepted in this European country”. But listing only Maestro (and not “V Pay” and CB), in my opinion, does not make sense.
Morning! Sorry for expressing myself earlier not well enough; it wasn’t my idea to insist on a synonymous relation at all. As you say, my original question for a “debit card” payment option was driven by the underlying asumption that this would catch basically the “non-credit card backed” bank cards used for cashless payment (which I assume is predominantly Maestro, but of course not limited to it).
Any offers on a definition for a telegram query interface, please?
