demkr

I have had some issues lately with dines posting, and have had to submit them manually to iDine, so I decided to see if I could figure out what was going on.

I mainly use a Chip and Signature card that I have registered with the iDine program. I have noticed that more and more restaurants in the United States, particularly in the last couple of months, have a card terminal in which chips can be run.

In these restaurants, two in particular, I saw that on my receipts it said something like "Chip Card Read." In *all* of these instances, the dine did not capture onto my iDine account.

Thus, I am concluding that iDine seems to be unable to recognize the transaction unless a card is swiped instead of inserted into a chip-capable card terminal. Has anyone else had difficulty with this?

Until I get some guidance from iDine about this, I am going to ask that my card be swiped

Open Jaw

I have a chip/signature card but I haven't used a the chip yet. I only swipe the card. What has RN/iDine told you? They will investigate any machine problems.

sdsearch

You can't. The card insists on what ever method it insists on. If the terminal does not have EMV (chip technology) enabled, it insists on swiping. If the terminal does have EMV enabled, if you swipe the card, the terminal will insist that you insert the card instead. Neither you nor the checkout clerk has a say in the matter, the technology decides on its own.

If you're that worried about it and convinced the chip card is the problem, switch to a card that doesn't have EMV yet. (Surely you must have such a card still active, given all the banks that haven't started issuing EMV widely yet?)

But meanwhile, it could be a much simpler answer: The Rewards Network dine tracking at a particular restaurant is tied to a specific checkout terminal that the restaurant registered with RN. If these restaurants updated to a new terminal but didn't notify RN, that (rather than the card technology) may the reason you dines aren't posting. So stop trying to defeat the technology and talk to RN (on the phone, ie interactively with a real human).

Points Scrounger

I believe he was saying that the staff were sticking the card in the chip slot, instead of swiping it, not the diner himself?

Open Jaw

I understood what he was saying. My point was I believe he should contact RN/iDine to inform them that the chip readers were not registering his dines. I would think RN/iDine would then begin an investigation as to why they aren't working correctly.

Finally, I have begun to think that CCs with chips cannot earn points/miles unless they are swiped. If true, I hope RN/iDine will release some info to clarify this issue.

sdsearch

What are these two restaurants that support EMV? I've not heard of EMV being supported at RN restaurants before. It would be useful for us to know, in case we visit them, so that we can pull out an EMV card if we want to see what happens or so that we can pull out a non-EMV card if we want it all to hopefully post more smoothly.

Also they're doing this out of your sight? I'd love to see what they do with a PIN-priority card like Diners Club US MC* (which demands a pin even for a $1 purchase at Wal-Mart, where all signature-priority EMV cards typically don't ask for a signature if the purchase is below $50). The whole point of EMV in restaurants is that they're supposed bring the terminal to you (or you to the terminal) and have you insert the card, so that in case it's a PIN-priority card you can key in the PIN. (EMV terminals at restaurants also tend to prompt for the tip, expecting it to decided before the card is pulled out, as opposed to swipe where it's decided after the card is swiped.)

*PIN-priority chip cards are rare in the US, but they're very common in some European countries, so a restaurant should expect to get them eventually once it enables EMV, especially if in a more "cosmopolitan" US city.

Sant

The Chip & Signature card is not the same as the Chip & Pin. They can easily run the card out of sight. Instead of requesting a pin, the machine prints out the form for the signature.

Although the waitstaff always expected the machine to ask for my pin, they didn't flinch when the paper for my signature printed from the machine.

sdsearch

I know that. Reread my post. In the next sentence after what you quoted, I was saying if someone used a chip & PIN card there.

Btw, are you also referring to a restaurant in the dining program that has EMV enabled? If so, please list it. We so far have no heard of any specific ones.

Points Scrounger

There is a report of RN stating that they are responsible for capturing SWIPED transactions only! Sounds as these transactions would need to have the receipt sent in for retroactive credit.

chix

Another sign that Rewards Network is way behind the times technologically. The are a dinosaur in the making as their systems are antiquated. Chip cards are going to be huge in 2015 and most pos terminals will default to chips next year.

To further complicate, many chips use alternate card number sequences. Another example is that Apple Pay charges using a few different digits on the end of the card sequence.

The recent security breaches have required banks and retailers to upgrade ASAP and RN is not keeping up with this.

I expect RN/iDine to go bankrupt or be sold very soon. They just can't keep up and have limited financial resources.

tmiw

Sorry to bring back this thread from the dead but apparently RN does support EMV/chip, at least when a phone or card is tapped. Here's the receipt (note the AID line at bottom, which is required when a chip-based transaction is run):



According to the email I also earned 44 miles from eating there, which is expected based on the purchase amount above. I used Apple Pay but I would imagine that inserting a physical card would have worked too.

FWIW I went to a non-RN restaurant in the US that had upgraded their card reader. With the Diner's Club card I had to go to the back kitchen/employee only area to enter the PIN. Had I used a chip and signature card it likely would have worked like swipe cards do now, where they take the card from you and bring it back with a signature slip. We'll see what happens but it doesn't look promising that we'll see the portable readers in any significant capacity.

Points Scrounger

Do you recall whether you were able to add the tip to your card? My recent similar experience it came through as zero (possibly the server bypassed it in error before the PIN prompt appeared). I left the tip in cash.

tmiw

The server put it through as $0.00 but there was an empty tip line on the receipt as well and the server claimed that additional tip could be added. I wasn't comfortable testing that so I just left cash.

Points Scrounger

I checked the merchant copy carefully (handed both), and what looked like a tip line was actually a signature lime with the words "Signature Not Required" nearby. I put an X.

sdsearch

The other week I ate at (newly participating) Maya Inn in Mission Viejo, CA. I was doing take-out, so I was right there at the cashier's podium when the card was run. I saw my BofA Visa card being inserted (never swiped) and the cashier pushed a couple buttons and then the receipt (with "chip read" on it) printed with a tip line. I wrote in a tip, and it ended up being added just as it would be for a swipe transaction. And the dine posted automatically to RN.

And just now I looked over some recent receipts, and noticed that Nizam Indian Cuisine in (west) Los Angeles's last couple receipts said "chip read" (using the same BofA Visa). On those write-in tips worked "as usual" too, to the point that I never realized they had switched to using EMV. And those have been mostly posting fine, though I think I may have one missing post from them to resolve from a month or two ago, which may or may not be from when they switched terminals. (Please note, any time a merchant switches terminals for any reason you can end up with a missing dine.)