Global Chip & PIN Implementation

Is it true that chip & PIN implementation (card payments) in the US is only at around 15% country-wide? If so, that’s absolutely crazy :open_mouth:

2 Likes

Haha yeah that sounds about right. I only got to use the chip + PIN at the 7-Eleven and McDonald’s. Every other brand still swipes the card. Most restaurants bring you a receipt after they swiped your card where you still have to add your tip and then sign it off. Then you just leave that receipt on the table and they’ll adapt the creditcard transaction accordingly.

Fun fact: every time someone swipes my card in Europe it gets blocked instantly for suspected fraud. Happened a few times in the US as well. Having two or more cards is mandatory from what I learned.

3 Likes

That’s absolutely crazy to me haha. I don’t know a single place in the UK that doesn’t offer chip & PIN. I can’t believe you have to manually sign things etc.

4 Likes

I come from a country where PIN and contactless payments are available everywhere. Like, I don’t ever have cash on me (and haven’t had for many years). Anywhere I go I can pay by card, even on the local markets (I love across the pond - to the East).

So yeah, you’re not the only one that had a hard time believing this type of transactions still exist today. But honestly, when you first visit the US, this is the least surprising thing :stuck_out_tongue:

2 Likes

Likewise, I never have cash. I guess I’ve got a lot ahead of me when I fly to the states on Monday!

1 Like

Cool! What city / state are you headed to?

I’m flying to Annapolis, Maryland on business :stuck_out_tongue: I’m hopefully going to be meeting up with @Mason while I’m over there :smiley:

8 Likes

Aaah I’ve never been there myself, but the East coast feels pretty European to my experience. That gradually changes when you move to the West. And then there’s the crazy West Coast, with Vegas, LA and Silicon Valley. It’s an amazingly beautiful country and people tend to be much more friendly towards the east so I’m sure you’ll have a great time.

Enjoy yourselves! You’ll definitely enjoy the little things like the school buses and the monster cars on your first visit. You’ll kinda feel like you’re in a movie when you first get off the plane. At least that’s what I got when I first traveled to the US.

2 Likes

Maryland is almost the same size as The Netherlands :wink:

Enjoy your trip !

1 Like

God if something needs to die off quicker it’s that stupid chip. Just let me swipe my card and run away. Not insert it 50x because the machine can’t read my chip on my brand new card. Or say “please remove card” then proceeded to yell at me for removing card and restart the transaction.

1 Like

I feel like any implementation that you’ve used has been awful in comparison to what we have haha. Chip & PIN machines with built-in contactless are basically everywhere, and it’s incredibly reliable. Insert card, enter PIN, done. Alternatively, tap your card, done. Not to mention that magstripe is also incredibly insecure.

4 Likes

Contactless chip payments have been around for at least 5 years. You just put the card on the reader and you’re done. The benefit over swiping it is that it’s very easy to skim a card that was swiped.

1 Like

I’ve tried it in multiple states in dozens of stores with a dozen different variations of the machine with more then 1 card type. All of them fail miserably.

Everywhere that I have seen that has adapted the chip got rid of the tap function for even like Apple/Samsung pay. If you see something with Apple/Samsung pay around here thankfully it’s prob just swipe.

Yeah, I think the implementation is just bad throughout the states. You should try it in Europe, it rarely ever fails (maybe 1% of the time, honestly), I don’t use anything else. I think magstripe’s wide adoption was dropped many years ago.

2 Likes

With all due respect, but just because the US failed to implement the “tap to pay” system for creditcards doesn’t mean that it’s not working. It has been working in many countries for well over 5 years. Like, I don’t think I’ve ever swiped a card in Europe simply because at the time it was removed I was not old enough to have a card.

2 Likes

Contacless is everywhere here and I hate it. Too sensible and a wide range, people don’t need to tap just need to be near a POS, and I’ve had family members being ripped of because of it.
Go to MacDonalds pay for their meal and be billed for other poeople meals… from what I heard…

To be honest I don’t liek to use cards, because here evey card payment gets sent to the state.
I don’t feel the need for the government to know where i ate, when, and what. fk that! I prefer to pay in cash.

That sucks. Contactless is very reliable here, I’ve never had any issues myself and neither has anyone else that I’ve spoken to about it.

1 Like

Thankfully some banks are now doing away with chips. The one I mainly use started issuing new cards without them about a month ago and I need to contact them.

They also did away with the ability to use Samsung/Apple pay which I am kinda peeved about but oh well.

1 Like

I understand your perspective, but relying on magstripe isn’t a good thing. Chip & PIN is a fantastic solution, it’s just a shame that it clearly hasn’t been implemented or adopted with in the US.

The card payments being sent to the government is regardless of the way you made the card payment so I’ll park that discussion.

I’ve been using tap to pay for well over 5 years all around the world, and never ran into any issue. But then again, some people feel the need to blame others for their own mistakes. It’s technically not really possible to pay for something without physical contact with the NFC chip, so it has to be very close to the machine (it’s a passive chip). What country are you from if I may ask?

1 Like