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Swiping left on magnetic stripes

mastercard.com

161–170 of 325 posts

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#161
post #158

What a sad day. Swipes were far more user friendly and the failure rate with reading these chips is unreal. Here's to hoping the next "upgrade" isn't a nightmare.

Contactless works pretty well in my experience and doesn’t put any physical wear on the card. There’s a couple big retailers still holding out, but most places I go seem to have it enabled these days.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#162
post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really is mind blowing to me. Especially in a pandemic, why why why require a signature for anything? This is one of the few things that would reduce exposure that we already have a technical solution for. I just don’t understand.

>Especially in a pandemic, why why why require a signature for anything? This is one of the few things that would reduce exposure that we already have a technical solution for. Turns out infection from surfaces is basically a non-issue. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/08/health/coronavirus-hygien...

Coronavirus isn't the only virus to be concerned with, Norovirus is a well known one that can spread through surfaces, which is why it can be so rampant on cruise ships -- and it can live for weeks on surfaces.

https://www.cdc.gov/norovirus/about/transmission.html

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#163

Still a LOT of merchants that need to upgrade equipment to do chip cards including some large franchises. There is a real problem that chip reading devices do not yet have anywhere near the longevity that magswipe use does. Machines go out of service for repair and cleaning after as little as a month of use in busy locations. Magstripe machines typically lasted 12 months plus before needing attention.

In Finland they motivated the stores to upgrade by telling them that after date X they would be responsible for any fraudulent transactions done with a magstrip.

The transition went really fucking fast after that =)

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#164
post #6

So most of my current cards (in Europe) have 3 interaction methods: In order of decreasing readability/communication reliability: 1. Magnetic stripe 2. NFC 3. EMV The EMV ("chip") method is the least insecure, but lately all of my cards have been started oxidating. And it seems like the pogo pins in almost all readers also started wearing out too. Chip reader failures have become very common lately. It's very common…

I can't remember ever having paid using the magnetic stripe in Europe since 2010 (having been to Spain, Italy, France, Netherlands, Romania and living in Germany), before I didn't use a credit card at all since it wasn't very popular here. Honestly curios: where (and when) did you make that observation?

It's a wonder if you can actually pay by card in Germany :D They're hardcore cash users for some weird reason.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#165
post #158

What a sad day. Swipes were far more user friendly and the failure rate with reading these chips is unreal. Here's to hoping the next "upgrade" isn't a nightmare.

I've been exclusively using the chip in my Credit and Debit Cards for at least a decade - every transaction works, every time for the life of the card. I've used them from Botswana to Egypt to Morocco to Canada through Central and South America and Australia.

They work perfectly.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#166
I use my credit card at brick and mortar merchants less and less -- even my local gas station accepts Android/Apple Pay (and presumably contactless card taps, but I couldn't get it to work with my card). Even the cafe I frequent switched to readers (I think they were Square) associated with an iPad so I add a tip and pay with my phone at the table.

But what are they doing to secure online payments? Last time my card number was stolen, all of the fradulent charges were at online merchants.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#167
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USA is a big holdup. I just traveled across the country and there are still filling (petrol) stations where the only card reader is stripe. See also other comments about the stripe being a fallback for chip as chip readers on POS terminals seem to be more fragile than magnetic stripe readers. FWIW, Contactless is very hit-or-miss for me in the US; about 1/3 the time it just doesn't work at all (even with multiple…

Yea, the Achilles Heel of contactless (or phone/NFC) in the USA is the uncertainty that it's supported and the terrible UX for failure cases. How many times have you had this happen? Your groceries are all rung up and the POS terminal is waiting. You dig out your phone or contactless card and try to invoke the contactless payment system. Nothing's happening. You wave it around a little. Still nothing. Grocery cashier…

It’s not a problem with the tech — just a matter of time and adoption. Swipe cards used to be just as problematic back in the day. Many places didn’t accept them either, and then if they did, it took a lengthy dial-up connection to process. Sometimes it would fail and retry multiples times, and if it still didn’t work, the cashier would grab one of these out from under the counter: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/41xAsDSTsXL...

Now those are slow. But hey, this is back in the time when people would write checks at the checkout.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#168
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The USA is a big holdup. I just traveled across the country and there are still filling (petrol) stations where the only card reader is stripe. See also other comments about the stripe being a fallback for chip as chip readers on POS terminals seem to be more fragile than magnetic stripe readers. FWIW, Contactless is very hit-or-miss for me in the US; about 1/3 the time it just doesn't work at all (even with multiple…

Yea, the Achilles Heel of contactless (or phone/NFC) in the USA is the uncertainty that it's supported and the terrible UX for failure cases. How many times have you had this happen? Your groceries are all rung up and the POS terminal is waiting. You dig out your phone or contactless card and try to invoke the contactless payment system. Nothing's happening. You wave it around a little. Still nothing. Grocery cashier…

Here in the UK everywhere accepts chip and contactless. It rarely fails, and when it does everyone assumes its the card reader rather than the card. It's common for people to claim they'll stop shopping in places where the card readers fail, which means there's an incentive for retailers to keep them well maintained.

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#169

Still a LOT of merchants that need to upgrade equipment to do chip cards including some large franchises. There is a real problem that chip reading devices do not yet have anywhere near the longevity that magswipe use does. Machines go out of service for repair and cleaning after as little as a month of use in busy locations. Magstripe machines typically lasted 12 months plus before needing attention.

Why aren't they using nfc?

Re: Swiping left on magnetic stripes

#170
post #158

What a sad day. Swipes were far more user friendly and the failure rate with reading these chips is unreal. Here's to hoping the next "upgrade" isn't a nightmare.

What country are you in? In the past 10 or so years, I have NEVER had a failure with a Chip-and-Pin transaction or a contactless transaction in Canada.
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