5 ms·

One of my good friends is Canadian, and he is a manager at a Shopper Drug Mart in Toronto. He said once Canada went to chip-and-PIN, that the incidence of frau

by steven2012 11y ago

One of my good friends is Canadian, and he is a manager at a Shopper Drug Mart in Toronto. He said once Canada went to chip-and-PIN, that the incidence of fraud essentially went to zero. The only time there is fraud is when the cashier isn't paying attention and allows a transaction that is swipe instead of PIN, via some special way the customer can swipe the card (pulling it out too quickly or something). The idea that PIN doesn't bring fraud down to almost zero is ridiculous and it really is about fees. That's why debit card transactions with PIN have such low interchange, because the PIN brings the fraud down to essentially zero as well.

cperciva 11y ago
some special way the customer can swipe the card (pulling it out too quickly or something). When chip cards were introduced here, the cards and the readers weren't very reliable, so the rule was "if the reader can't talk to the chip, you swipe the card instead". This would happen if the card wasn't fully inserted, if the contacts were dirty or corroded, etc. That lasted maybe two years before the fraud increased and the reliability improved to the point that the fallback wasn't worthwhile. Now if a chip doesn't read the answer is "try it again" followed by "do you have a different card?"
- danbolt 11y ago
  I vividly remember that turning point in Canada a few years ago. My techno-enthusiastic brain had never been so excited to pull out cash to pay for a coffee.
raverbashing 11y ago
Exactly this The rest is whining by merchants. And look their fraud levels are going down, so they have a reason to like it Chip-and-pin existed elsewhere a long time ago, if anyone got a non-chip-and-pin reader on the last 5 years they should have known better Oh I forgot in the US nobody knows the rest of the world exists
- jacobolus 11y ago
  The merchants are the ones calling for chip-and-PIN. What they are whining about is high interchange fees, and their whining is entirely justified. Visa & the rest of the credit card industry is a racket, an extra sales tax on all retail with the proceeds going to a handful of very rich people. Merchants are furious about the required upgrade to a chip-and-signature system which requires them to pay for expensive upgrades to all their POS machines and is much slower to validate than swiped cards, but leaves high interchange fees and doesn’t appreciably bring down their fraud liability.
  - raverbashing 11y ago
    > Visa & the rest of the credit card industry is a racket, an extra sales tax on all retail with the proceeds going to a handful of very rich people. Well, I agree, but first of all, getting payed in money is not free as well, and second, they should pass that fee on to the consumer then.

cperciva 11y ago

some special way the customer can swipe the card (pulling it out too quickly or something). When chip cards were introduced here, the cards and the readers weren't very reliable, so the rule was "if the reader can't talk to the chip, you swipe the card instead". This would happen if the card wasn't fully inserted, if the contacts were dirty or corroded, etc. That lasted maybe two years before the fraud increased and the reliability improved to the point that the fallback wasn't worthwhile. Now if a chip doesn't read the answer is "try it again" followed by "do you have a different card?"

danbolt 11y ago
I vividly remember that turning point in Canada a few years ago. My techno-enthusiastic brain had never been so excited to pull out cash to pay for a coffee.

raverbashing 11y ago

Exactly this The rest is whining by merchants. And look their fraud levels are going down, so they have a reason to like it Chip-and-pin existed elsewhere a long time ago, if anyone got a non-chip-and-pin reader on the last 5 years they should have known better Oh I forgot in the US nobody knows the rest of the world exists

jacobolus 11y ago
The merchants are the ones calling for chip-and-PIN. What they are whining about is high interchange fees, and their whining is entirely justified. Visa & the rest of the credit card industry is a racket, an extra sales tax on all retail with the proceeds going to a handful of very rich people. Merchants are furious about the required upgrade to a chip-and-signature system which requires them to pay for expensive upgrades to all their POS machines and is much slower to validate than swiped cards, but leaves high interchange fees and doesn’t appreciably bring down their fraud liability.
- raverbashing 11y ago
  > Visa & the rest of the credit card industry is a racket, an extra sales tax on all retail with the proceeds going to a handful of very rich people. Well, I agree, but first of all, getting payed in money is not free as well, and second, they should pass that fee on to the consumer then.