This has changed quite substantially over the last five+ years. It certainly used to be the case that using certain cards that were very common in the rest of Europe (particularly credit cards, but also things like visa debit) required jumping through hoops in the Netherlands, and often weren't accepted.

A Dutch friend, who knows the industry a little, said that the Dutch banks had gone their own way with payment systems in the past. This heritage had taken some time to unwind. (I guess he was talking about things like Chipknip?)