Consumer education & preparedness for EMV debit cards

by: Brandon Kuehl

In my last blog post I excerpted a recent white paper I wrote for community financial institution (FI) card issuers, America’s Next Step in EMV: Debit Cards.

In the follow-on excerpt below, I look at whether consumers are ready for debit EMV, the liability shift and what it will take to properly configure EMV chip cards for the most positive cardholder experience.

“Worldwide, there are nearly 37 million active EMV terminals. In the U.S., millions of new EMV-capable terminals are either in place or being shipped to merchants as this paper is being read. Within Walmart’s 4,800 U.S. stores, for instance, every terminal is EMV ready. Remember, however, these terminals are not ready to route debit EMV cards to the regional PIN networks. EMV debit cards will work at Walmart, but they will operate much in the same way a signature-only debit card does today.

Oberthur Technologies President Martin Ferenczi predicted that by the end of 2014, every U.S. household would have at least one card with a chip. Many of these are likely to be credit cards. However, as more U.S. credit cardholders become aware of and comfortable with EMV chip cards, more may come calling for a debit option. Issuers are most likely to hear first from those international travelers who may be a bit farther along on the education scale. As they grow more accustomed to using chip cards in Canada, Mexico and overseas, they may soon be looking for a globally interoperable way to transact from their checking accounts…

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