I tried to pay with a credit card at a gas station and was told they only accept debit.  That annoyed me, but I complied.  Upon swiping my debit card, the machine asked me if I was ok with paying a mandatory $0.45 transaction fee.  I considered waving around a lit match until I got my way, but I instead decided to stew about it for a few days and later blog about it. 

The thing is, transaction fees typically aren't a large percentage of the overall purchase, so they shouldn't be a big deal.  I think it's a problem with the wording.  In my mind, "transaction fee" translates into "charging you for charging you" or "paying for the privilege of paying."  And that's pretty much the stupidest thing in the history of anything.  I understand that in my case, I was using a payment method that actually incurred more cost to the merchant, and they were simply passing that cost on to the customer in an attempt to compete with other merchants selling similar products.  The logic is there, but it still sucks.  I wouldn't have minded paying another few cents a gallon, but tagging it on to the beginning of the transaction really made me want to cause physical harm to someone, and the poor guy behind the counter was almost on the receiving end. #business