Adoption of EMV technology in the U.S is important, because it provides protection against losses from counterfeit cards.
EMV, or chip cards, are the standard for secure point-of-sale (POS) transactions. Unlike magnetic stripe cards, chip cards are very difficult to counterfeit because of an embedded microchip that exchanges unique, dynamic data with a terminal each time it’s used.
To encourage the timely adoption of EMV, the leading payment networks have implemented an EMV Fraud Liability Shift that began in October 2015.
Both parties, card issuer and the merchant need to invest with EMV technology. If only one party has adopted EMV technology, the party that didn’t make the investment will be held liable.
For the card issuer, they came out with the chip cards, where all credit and debit cards have this security chips that are harder to counterfeit than magnetic strips.
For the merchant, an EMV capable terminals or POS hardware that can take advantage of the card’s security chip is needed.
With any new technology, there is a learning curve, and here are the things that you need to know.
For cardholders – with a chip card instead of swiping your card, you are going to do what is called card dipping; by inserting your card face-up and chip-first into the terminal slot. Wait and follow the terminal prompts, and only remove your card once the transaction is complete.
If you did a swipe on a chip card, an EMV-enabled terminal should prompt you to insert the card instead. If the terminal is not enabled for chip, you can still be able to swipe your card.
Employees will benefit from training – Once a merchant enables their EMV terminals, it is important to train your staff with talking points about why chip cards benefit consumers with greater security, and how they are used by helping customers with the new checkout process.
New mobile payment methods leverage both EMV and NFC, so the industry is now seeing greater interest in mobile payments among merchants and consumers.
There’s a lot of resources out there to help businesses make the transition with this EMV technology.