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What happens when you swipe a credit card
31–40 of 178 posts
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because swiping is so much more convenient. With a magnetic transaction I can just swipe and put my card away. Most of the time I swipe at the beginning of a long checkout (grocery store). With a chip transaction, I need to leave the card in until the very end. I now need to leave my wallet out, or put the wallet away and then remember to take the card back. More card readers are optimized for swiping with card inser…
You can actually put your card in at the beginning with certain machines in the UK, and then it picks it up once the cashier starts the payment process. You'll get weird looks if you do. The slot for the card is almost always at the bottom, under the PIN pad. I assume the US uses different machines, since you need to do some awkward signature thing?
This is what a payment terminal looks like in most US chain stores. It would be attached to a mount of some sort on the customer side of a cashier booth:
http://www.ncrcounterpoint.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1...
It has a slot for a chip card at the bottom, a slot to swipe a card on the right, a PIN pad for debit transactions, and may be tap-enabled. The screen portion displays the order total and other instructions, and is also touch-sensitive for providing a signature using the attached stylus.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#33Earlier quoted context omitted.
Exactly! He said that with such authority, didn't he? :) Chase just issued me a chip card in the last couple of years, and every time I check out of a store equipped with a terminal that can do both, it's still pretty much a 50/50 chance they'll tell me the chip reader doesn't work yet and I need to swipe.
In my experience most stores are pretty good at this point about having some sort of sign or label if their chip reader isn't working. But I'm sure it's not always the case and there was certainly a lot of confusion a year or so ago when they were first phased in.
Well, now they would do well to put a sign up if the chip reader is working. Because now I by default assume the terminal vendor is lazy and won't implement it until they have a financial incentive to do so.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
Chip cards replaced swiping over a decade ago, and a couple of years ago contactless replaced chip cards for most purposes. Does anyone literally swipe a credit card any more? I can't remember seeing it done in years except in some parts of Europe.
well, there's the rest of the world, and there's the US, where chip cards are recent and still lack chip+pin requirement for now. we still use imperial units, too! not to mention the worst (read: non-existent) maternity-leave laws on earth - worse than many less developed countries.
> well, there's the rest of the world, and there's the US, where chip cards are recent and still lack chip+pin requirement for now.
And don't forget paper checks are still circulating. I didn't try last time I was there but I imagine that when you go to cash a paper check you go to a guy sitting by an abacus.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#35> swipe your card Sadly swiping is being replaced by chipcard.
Chip cards replaced swiping over a decade ago, and a couple of years ago contactless replaced chip cards for most purposes. Does anyone literally swipe a credit card any more? I can't remember seeing it done in years except in some parts of Europe.
Agreed. I never use cash and contactless is now so pervasive that I actually struggle to remember my PIN when I need to use Chip+PIN.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#36Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#37> swipe your card Sadly swiping is being replaced by chipcard.
is it really that difficult to touch terminal with your card and put it away? much faster than cash or entering PIN
Parent said "chip card" not "contactless".
And the requirement for a PIN (or signature, depending on region) has more to do with amount than with method.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because swiping is so much more convenient. With a magnetic transaction I can just swipe and put my card away. Most of the time I swipe at the beginning of a long checkout (grocery store). With a chip transaction, I need to leave the card in until the very end. I now need to leave my wallet out, or put the wallet away and then remember to take the card back. More card readers are optimized for swiping with card inser…
Why do you want to put your card in at the start? Why not put it in at the end when it's time to pay?
Parellel vs serial
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why sadly?
Because swiping is so much more convenient. With a magnetic transaction I can just swipe and put my card away. Most of the time I swipe at the beginning of a long checkout (grocery store). With a chip transaction, I need to leave the card in until the very end. I now need to leave my wallet out, or put the wallet away and then remember to take the card back. More card readers are optimized for swiping with card inser…
The swipe is a 1 second job, but the insert+PIN takes maybe 10sec. I do the card+pin at any point while the cashier is registering my groceries. By the time he finished scanning them all, the card has been back in my pocket a long time. The only thing I do at the end is hit "ok" to confirm the amount. The procedure would be exactly the same with a magnetic card.
Even just the convenience of a more reliable read is worth it.
Re: What happens when you swipe a credit card
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
What happens if you get to the end and you want to dispute the cost and you've already swiped your card? Is it too late?
The swipe transaction system doesn't provide a mechanism to authorize a transaction for a specific amount, unlike the chip system. That is - you swipe, and the merchant uses the details on the magstripe to make some arbitrary transaction later on - potentially weeks or months later as I've found out in the very few places in the UK that still run offline transaction systems. With a chip system, you authorize a specif…
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