Chip-card checkout nightmares? WSJ’s Joanna Stern explains the transition to the new EMV chip cards for credit and debit, and why your smartphone is the real answer to all your payment problems.
It seems amazing that the U.S. is having such a tough time with this while the rest of the world has been using it for a while now.
The “rest of the world” being Canada, Switzerland and, partially, the UK (partially because the spending limit on these transactions is so low that they really cover nothing above a bus ticket or junk food). That Is certainly something, but not really the rest of the world.
Adding to that: most smaller shops here do still have these terminals on dial-up modem lines, so even where it does work (very little to begin with), there is really no speed improvement. If I remember correctly – even the old method with carbon copies and that slider thingy went faster.
Works great in Canada, especially at gas stations. I hate the hassle of filling up in the US when I don’t have a zip code to enter.
I was just in Poland and everywhere I went it worked great as well. Even better most places support Paypass, and by proxy Apple Pay and it was awesome.
No, even on dialup it’s pretty fast.
I love tap and pay in Canada. Honestly I don’t use Apple Pay that much because the cards work so well.
This quote summarizes our precious country so well these days, “It seems amazing that the U.S. is having such a tough time with this while the rest of the world has been using it for a while now.”
Yeh I was installing these systems about 5 years ago all over Australia. They’re ok on dialup, far better on 3G/LTE or ideally adsl (at the time) with a 3G fallback,
Can’t believe the USA hasn’t had this tech. Thought you were ahead! Now hardly ever use the chip- “payWave” which I also installed units for at the same time is far preferable, and if it’s over 100aud you are asked for your Pin code which you’ve forgotten since it’s not used enough – that is my only complaint about the whole system, you forget your PIN!
Our banks are all being pricks except for one (hey ANZ you’ll have a new customer v soon!) ganging up using our competitive commission as a “monopoly tool” against Apple, android pay I’m surprised they haven’t had a whine about paypal. They should be heading the way of Blockbuster video and other resistors of disruptive tech soon….
saying that, payWave works so well some just stick their card inside their phone case
Let me know when the rest of the world gets to the moon, m’kay?
Maybe here in New England it’s being adopted more readily because it only takes about 8 seconds or so.
Additionally most terminals I’ve used and most places I go, especially these days, they accept the chip reader.
I don’t even ask anymore like I used to, I just put the card in the chip reader, wait a few seconds, hear the beep and take the card out.
I do think we should be using chip and pin systems though. It’s only secure unles some unauthorized person has my card, and while they may not have it long, it could be long enough. With a pin that would be a moot point.
I can think of a LOT of issues where America is way behind the rest of the world…
If deregulated big banks are being relied upon to roll out new infrastructure like this, of course they’ll drag their feet and give it no attention. Especially while fraud remediation is still cheaper for them.