Daily Dose of Common Sense

Debit cards are increasingly popular, and for good reason. It’s the convenience of plastic without the temptation to spend money you don’t really have.

But should you sign or enter your PIN? Although I’m a technologist, I’ll be the first to admit it’s just as much, if not more, of a business issue.

Thankfully both types of concerns land on the side of, in my opinion, only using your PIN when you withdraw cash from an ATM (and make sure it’s a legit ATM at that!).

On the business side, most card issuers offer better fraud protection if you sign for a debit purchase than if you use your PIN. This is at least partly due to the fact that when you sign, the transaction gets processed by the MasterCard or VISA networks, and at minimum you get the fraud protection offered by them. You should check with your card issuer to get the details.

The credit card networks used when you sign also offer better fraud detection, as they can analyze the data from many card issuers.

On the technology side, it’s a question of the risk to your PIN and the impact if it gets compromised. ATMs, especially the major brands like NCR and Diebold used by the big banks, are built with security in mind. The keypad module has built-in encryption and its tamper-proof, for instance.

Other equipment where you use your card and enter your PIN is unlikely to be as secure. Even if it is, a clever person can skim your card in the blink of an eye and have a surreptitious camera recording your PIN.

Once they have your PIN in addition to your card #, they can create a fake card and then carry out the less consumer-protected PIN transactions instead of just being limited to signature transactions if they didn’t have your PIN.

Depending on your bank and what other info they have, they might even be able to access your account(s) through your bank’s web site because they have your PIN as well.

If all that isn’t enough to convince you, consider this: more and more, banks are enrolling their debit card customers in rewards programs similar to the ones offered for credit cards, but you only get rewards for signature transactions.

More protection and free stuff. Sounds like a winning combination to me.

Photo

One thing I’ve noticed about suburban shopping is that it’s hard to return a shopping cart. Why else would you see a parking lot like this:

Actually, it’s not hard to return a shopping cart. It’s fairly easy. There are cart return sections all over most parking lots. Some people just won’t expend the effort. In this particular photo, there were at least six parking spaces rendered unusable because of the unreturned carts.

I have also seen carts bang into cars, people, and buildings. All because someone wasn’t courteous enough to take two minutes to return the cart to a proper place. Come on, are we so lazy?