Visa welcomes roll out of PIN technology for faster transactions
Australian payment card industry and merchants launch major payments network upgrade
Australian consumers will soon have the choice of entering a PIN (Personal Identification Number) instead of a signature to verify credit and debit card transactions, Visa International said today.
Mr. Bruce Mansfield, Visa’s General Manager for Strategic Innovations, Asia Pacific, said the Australian payment card industry and merchants would roll out the use of PIN at point of sale from 4 June 2008.
“The introduction of PIN is part of a major industry-wide upgrade of the payments system that bringsAustralia into line with countries such as Japan, Korea, New Zealand and the UK,” Mr. Mansfield said.
“The introduction of PIN-based technology is designed to benefit both cardholders and retailers by speeding up transaction times, leading to shorter queues at the checkout.
“This is also a progressive step towards PIN use with chip card technology, which has been shown to be effective in cutting the level of counterfeit card fraud.
“Financial institutions would soon be communicating with their cardholders on using their current PIN or obtaining a new one.
“We expect cardholders will take up the option to use PIN because of the added speed and convenience it offers. It will also become increasingly beneficial for cardholders to use their PINs when traveling overseas to countries where PIN acceptance has already been introduced,” Mr Mansfield said.
Importantly, the use of PIN will not be mandatory and customers would be able to continue to use a signature without a PIN as normal to verify transactions.
An industry working group compromising Visa, card issuers and major payment card brands will launch a comprehensive campaign to communicate the changes to cardholders and retailers. It has also set up a website to provide more information (www.penorpin.com.au).
Media contact Andrew Woodward Visa International ausinfo@visa.com
About Visa Visa operates the world’s largest retail electronic payments network providing processing services and payment product platforms. This includes consumer credit, debit, prepaid and commercial payments, which are offered under the Visa, Visa Electron, Interlink and PLUS brands. Visa enjoys unsurpassed acceptance around the world and Visa/PLUS is one of the world's largest global ATM networks, offering cash access in local currency in more than 170 countries. For more information, visit www.corporate.visa.com.
