NEW YORK (AP) – Payment processor Visa Inc. said Saturday that it plans to begin separately classifying sales at gun stores, a major victory for gun control advocates who say it will help better track suspicious increases in gun sales that could be a prelude to a mass shooting.
But the decision by Visa, the world’s largest payment processor, is likely to draw the ire of gun rights advocates and gun lobbyists, who have argued that categorizing gun sales would unfairly single out an industry when most sales do not lead to mass shootings. It joins Mastercard and American Express, which also said they plan to move forward with the classification of gun store sales.
Visa said it would adopt the International Organization for Standardization’s new commercial code for arms sales, which was announced on Friday. Until Friday, gun store sales were considered “general merchandise.”
“Following ISO’s decision to establish a new merchant category code, Visa will proceed with the following steps, while ensuring that we protect all legitimate commerce on the Visa network in accordance with our long overdue,” the payment processor said in a statement.
Visa’s adoption is significant as the largest payment network, and with Mastercard and AmeEx, it will likely put pressure on banks as card issuers to adopt the standard as well. Visa acts as an intermediary between merchants and banks, and banks will decide whether to allow gun store sales to be made on their issued cards.
Gun control advocates had won major victories on that front in recent weeks. New York City officials and pension funds had pressured the ISO and banks to adopt this code.
Two of the nation’s largest public pension funds, in California and New York, have been pushing the nation’s largest credit card firms to establish specific sales codes for firearms-related sales that could flag suspicious purchases or more easily track how guns and ammo are sold.
Merchant category codes now exist for almost all types of purchases, including those made at supermarkets, clothing stores, coffee shops and many other retailers.
“When you buy a plane ticket or pay for your groceries, your credit card company has a special code for those retailers. It’s common sense that we have the same policies for gun and ammo stores ” said New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a former police captain who blames the proliferation of guns for his city’s deadly violence.
City Comptroller Brad Lander said it made moral and financial sense as a tool to roll back gun violence.
“Unfortunately, credit card companies have not supported this simple, practical and potentially life-saving tool. It’s about time they did,” Lander said recently, before Visa and others had adopted the move.
Lander is a trustee of the New York City Employees’ Retirement System, the Teachers’ Retirement System and the Board of Education Retirement System, which together own 667,200 American Express shares valued at approximately 92.49 million dollars; 1.1 million MasterCard shares valued at approximately $347.59 million; and 1.85 million Visa shares valued at approximately $363.86 million.
Pension funds and gun control advocates argue that creating a dealer category code for stand-alone firearms and ammunition stores could help in the battle against gun violence. A week before the mass shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, where 49 people died after a gunman opened fire in 2016, the gunman used credit cards to buy more than $26,000 worth of guns and ammunition , including purchases from a freelancer. arms retailer
Gun rights advocates argue that tracking gun store sales would unfairly target legal gun purchases, since dealer codes only track the type of dealer where it is used credit or debit card, not the actual items purchased. Selling a gun safe, worth thousands of dollars and an item considered part of responsible gun ownership, could be seen as a major purchase at a gun shop.
“(The industry’s) decision to create a specific firearms code is nothing more than a capitulation to anti-gun politicians and activists committed to eroding the rights of law-abiding Americans one transaction at a time ” said Lars Dalseide, spokesman for the National Rifle Association.
Over the years, public pension funds have used their broad investment portfolios to influence public policy and the market.
The California Teachers Fund, the nation’s second-largest pension fund, has long targeted the gun industry. It has divested its stakes in gun manufacturers and tried to persuade some retailers to sell guns.
Four years ago, the faculty fund made guns a key initiative. It called for background checks and asked retailers to “watch for irregularities at the point of sale, to record all firearm sales, to audit firearms inventory on a regular basis and to assist proactive law enforcement.”
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Associated Press writer Bobby Calvan in New York contributed to this report.