tmiw

Here's what a declined Apple Pay transaction looks like:



Swiping worked with that exact card. I'll need to call Chase later and ask what happened. It was a Verifone terminal like what Target, etc. have but there was no contactless icon, just the four dots.

scibot

Interesting, I wonder if its the same reason that Apple Pay declines at Big Lots!, but still works for Google Wallet, although I haven't heard of Google Wallet working at any Fuddruckers. If the local Fuddruckers has the MX915 or 925, then I'll have to try Google Wallet there, but if it declines they either blocked it or the pos is too old to support Contactless payments. So it seems that an ALDI (Debit only) and a Smashburger are now on the Paypass locator the latter if you wanted to try another burger place that may take Apple Pay.

tmiw

I remember using a physical AmEx card in contactless mode at Fuddruckers a while back and it worked fine. From what I heard from the Chase CSR it doesn't sound like they disabled it; she escalated a case up to whoever is in charge of this sort of thing so we'll see what happens. I'm not too torn up about it though since they don't claim that it works there (since they're not on the PayPass locator and all).

Now that I'm thinking about it I really hope I don't inadvertently get it disabled altogether there if it is something they didn't expect to be on.

AllieKat

Michael's has completely disabled contactless, Amex doesn't do anything there now. The US merchants' bizarre war against contactless payments marches on, while they continue to put none of that effort into enabling EMV chip transactions.

tmiw

Michaels is a MCX member; them disabling it should be no surprise. And since they've gotten hacked twice within the past 3-4 years (IIRC) I'm surprised they're still allowed to accept cards.

What I'd like to know is how CurrentC will work in a restaurant environment (Olive Garden). Will we finally see portable terminals at a US restaurant or will Olive Garden switch to a pay at the front model?

AllieKat

CurrentC will work? That's news to me.

And it isn't just MCX members engaging in a war against contactless. ULTA disabled theirs, they're not an MCX member. Subway disabled theirs here, they're not an MCX member.

And those are just disabling situations. Look at all the non-MCX members with contactless capable terminals that have contactless disabled: Sears, Bath & Body Works, Gamestop, Costco, etc.

There's an apparant war against contactless that US merchants are taking part in, MCX members and non-members alike.

tmiw

While that sucks, we have to realize that contactless may very well not make sense for some businesses and it's really merchant choice whether to accept it. Especially if the additional customers from implementing it doesn't make up for additional EMVco and card brand/acquirer certification and maintenance costs. Oh BTW, the EMVco certification for contact EMV isn't enough for contactless.

Also, it's extremely possible that contactless will never take off here nearly as much as it has elsewhere. MasterCard for example has been pushing it since 2007 at least (according to this commercial) and has only recently had a chance at being more widely adopted because of Apple Pay and EMV.

My personal theory is that contactless even if accepted everywhere will have lower usage until chip and PIN becomes more common simply because no CVM below a certain transaction amount (one of the main benefits of contactless) already exists with chip and signature. That said, I am using it more often now that merchant acceptance is a bit more likely.

D582

This is the US market's own doing though. It seems retailers in the US love to use fully-integrated card processing, and love to use the 'multi-media' PIN pads, putting a custom interface on them, showing ads, showing the purchase line items etc. This is also why so many merchants who have EMV capable terminals in the US still have not activated it - they need certification with their POS system software, and future changes to their POS software may also require recertification.

I will contrast this to the Canadian market where many multi-lane retailers use a semi-integrated solution which isolates the PIN pads from the POS system, and the only interaction between them is through an API/interface/middleware. The POS system does not play a part in processing the card transactions and the card data does not get passed through the POS system. Makes for easier PCI compliance as well. Most merchants also lease their PIN pads or terminals, so they get regular terminal upgrades. This is also a reason why contactless has taken off in Canada - as PIN pads were upgraded to newer models with contactless, it did not require changes to the merchant's POS system to handle it.

RedLight2015

Exactly this. Most POS systems in the United States have big flashy graphics and advertisements from the POS system itself, whereas in Europe a simple two line LCD graces the PIN pad, the latter being easier to update and implement.

RedLight2015

ALDI may take an AMPM like approach and only accept NFC if it's a debit card.

tmiw

Fuddruckers' MX915 doesn't look like they customized the software actually since the UI seems to be exactly the same as Rubios'. Also, I highly doubt Verifone would design things in such a way that a new EMVco approval would be needed simply to show ads and line items. New Visa/MC/acquirer approval though, possibly.

MX915 datasheet showing that it runs Linux: http://www.verifone.com/media/4300596/mx915_ds_ltr.pdf (PDF)
EMVco level 2 approval for Verifone: http://emvco.com/approvals.aspx?id=85#VERIFONEINC

One of those Linux software modules in the second link probably runs on the MX915/925 even though it's not explicitly mentioned. Even though they don't seem to publicly provide integration documentation it's totally possible that the retailer's code running on the terminal calls some sort of Verifone provided API or application to actually perform the EMV transaction.

The huge graphical terminals are only common at large retailers. A lot of smaller businesses are using the normal two line text LCD (FD35/FD100 combo for example).

RedLight2015

Judging by Walmart EMV, there must be some sort of separate API that the terminal calls for when using an EMV card. When inserting the card, the entire UI changes to match those bland ones that are normally found on a two line display, like those found in Europe, such as "PIN OK" after successful PIN entry.

RedLight2015

The purchase line items being displayed is due to some laws in certain states requiring some sort of customer display, with these businesses opting for the PIN pad since that is already considered a display facing the customer.

In all honesty, I prefer the multimedia PIN pads, as they are also more user friendly to operate, and integrate other uses such as Loyalty Cards, that most stores, have you just swipe through the PIN pad (such as Safeway Club)

tmiw

So I hate to upset people yet again but it looks like EMV contactless won't come to debit any time soon thanks to the whole common AID solution: http://www.cutoday.info/content/down...ebit_FINAL.pdf

As for debit on Apple Pay, it seems that the common AID is MSD with a cryptogram just like the Visa AID (I had to manually put the common AID first in cardpeek's list in order for it to get read). I don't know if this is any different for a debit card using the MasterCard common AID.

AllieKat

What terminal? I haven't seen this at Walmart on any of the EMV terminal models I've used (though I haven't been at a Walmart with MX 915's - I've heard they exist, though). The different UI, that is - it all seems to match up okay-ish to me.

If Apple can do it, I don't see why it couldn't be integrated in a card. It may be that the debit AID is a MSD application, but oh well. Done.