Manual credit card printers are becoming obsolete
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Manual credit card printers are becoming obsolete

Since the introduction of credit cards in the 1960s, cards have carried the card number, expiration date, and cardholder’s name in raised or embossed lettering on the plastic surface of the card. . Mechanical devices were developed and used to print credit card charge slips from those raised alphanumeric characters. Those receipts were then, over many years, deposited into the merchant’s bank account as checks to prove that the transaction took place. More recently, cards have been attached with a magnetic stripe and swiped through electronic devices that read and transmit card information to processing centers for verification and sale authorization.

Electronic processing has now become so standardized that Visa last year announced that it would phase out the stamping of card information on the card surface and that future cards will be “flat,” card information will be printed but it will only be accessible magnetically with the strip on the back. . Other card associations, MasterCard and the rest, will follow shortly.

Few merchants still manually take card impressions, with the exception of merchants that accept card payments for the delivery of goods or services ordered over the phone, like a pizzeria, for example. They do this to verify that the physical card was presented to the merchant during the transaction, in order to prevent fraudulent chargebacks.

In my own wallet I have an ePassporte Visa Electron card and the numbers are flat. No print can be taken.

And you no longer need to take any impressions. The new standard is to always swipe the card through a terminal, whether the terminal is in the store, by the register or in the POS system or is part of it, or through the use of a terminal wireless that the driver takes with him to the customer. for payment upon delivery.

If your business receives phone or mail orders and you manually enter credit card numbers into your terminal, you’re costing a lot of money in additional card processing fees. Manually entered transactions are processed as “non-qualifying” transactions at a rate more than double your base rate, due to the risk of fraud from card non-physical presence.

The fact is that card imprints are no longer a protection against fraud, because any criminal can create fake credit cards and use an Addressograph machine to engrave stolen credit card numbers on them. However, encoding a magnetic stripe on the back is almost impossible to counterfeit. The stripe contains not only the card number, but also other codes that, when swiped through a terminal, verify to the bank that the actual card is present and that it is swiping, not manually keyed in.

What can a trader do?

Other than buying some kind of portable photocopier to copy the customer’s card and maybe ID, all you can do is catch up with 21st century technology and equip your drivers or delivery staff with wireless credit card terminals. credit. Terminals can be purchased or leased from your credit card processor and pay for themselves quickly, because now all transactions they process will be made at a lower rate, such as card-present transactions.

These terminals include a printer so you can get a signed receipt from the customer after the transaction has been completed and authorized, and print a second copy of the receipt for the customer. As if the customer had physically been in your store.

I have equipped many mobile merchants with these devices: food delivery, locksmiths, massage therapists, computer technicians, handymen, plumbers, and other repair personnel; the list is growing every day as more businesses go mobile and deliver their goods and services to customers. The terminals are also ideal for fairs, shows, conventions, and other places where landline access is not available.

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