From: axel@white-eagle.invalid.uk
Subject: Credit card without chip and pin
Newsgroups: uk.finance uk.legal
Date: Sat, 08 Apr 2006 09:05:54 GMT


Last night in a restaurant my friend's Visa card was not accepted
as a means of payment because it was a foreign issued card with
'chip & pin'. By 'refused' I do not mean by any electronic system,
just that the resataurant refused to consider it on the grounds
that the bank had told them not to accept any cards not fitted
with a 'chip & pin' facility.

Fortunately we had other means of payment.

No other place where the same card had been used in the last week
in the UK had had any problems with accepting it.

I find the reason given as spurious - I cannot image that the banks
providing merchant card facilities intend that visitors to the UK
should not be able to use credit cards - and I suspect that the
staff at the restaurant have misinterpreted the regulations by
applying what perhaps should only apply to UK issued cards to all
cards. Would this be correct?

Had we had no other means of payment (or just decided to be bolshy),
I cannot see that the restaurant could have done much except either
accept the card or an IOU considering that the Visa sign was clearly
displayed on the door and neither there nor on the menu was there
any indication that only 'chip & pin' cards would be accepted.
Thoughts?

Axel