The Pandemic has really changed how credit cards are handled here. Pre-Pandemic, Tap and Pay was fairly rare, but now, it is everywhere (Nearly 90% by my informal count). The odd thing I noticed is that the smaller the market, the more likely the store/shop uses Tap and Pay.
American's are also using their phone more to pay.
Re:Swiping left on magnetic stripes
by kube-system on Tuesday August 17, 2021 @01:38AM
(#28206561)
For us ‘Mericans, all credit card transactions at a chip reader are chip+signature. We typically only have PIN numbers configured for debit cards. And most of those can be processed successfully without providing the PIN by pressing the credit button on the terminal.
Although, in many cases signatures aren’t necessary. Anecdotally, I can only recall having to sign a handful of times in the last five or so years. (Edit: outside of restaurants.)
Also: it’s important to remember that running a debit card as credit isn’t the same thing as using debit. At most banks, your credit limit for debit cards (weird sentence, yeah) is very low: like $500 or so. If you call (and have sufficient funds), they’ll often temporarily raise it for you. (It’s how I paid for school on a debit card when the school could only run it as credit.)
Every time I've been to the US it's still magnetic stripe in places like restaurants/bars where the wait staff whisk your card away and then 4 days later the charge ends up appearing on your card.
I saw chip and pin (or sometimes the odd chip and sign) appearing in the big shops/chains like walgreens though so I guess it's slowly changing.
It felt a bit like what the UK was like 15-20 years ago.