As a business owner, you know that secure payment processing is important, yet far too many businesses like yours are dragging their feet when it comes to EMV compliance.
Chip cards, as consumers typically refer to them, are now the standard for secure payments. They help reduce fraud, and give your customers an added layer of protection. We know that upgrading your equipment to offer this increased level of credit card transaction security can be frustrating, but let’s take a look at what happens to a customer when he or she is the victim of card fraud.
A customer who we’ll call Emily comes to your business and makes a purchase using her debit card. Meanwhile, your business has been targeted by
card cloners, and they are able to get her information from the swipe and create a new card. They go on a shopping spree, and get away with it because lax or busy employees often do not check IDs for credit transactions like they are supposed to.
A few days later, Emily is buying groceries when her debit card is declined. Standing there, with many people in line behind her, Emily is embarrassed and humiliated, while panicking about her bank account. Running home, she goes online and discovers that all of the money in her account is gone. She reports the issue to her bank, and it says it will launch an investigation, but now, because the October 1, 2015 EMV deadline has long since passed, the liability has shifted from the card issuer to the party that’s the least EMV-compliant in the fraudulent transactions, which, in all cases, is likely to be the merchants. Where the investigation and reimbursement once took several days, it could now take months to resolve. In the meantime, Emily struggles to pay her bills, to buy gas and groceries. Even once her checking account’s restored, she has to update an endless stream of online accounts. She’s also forced to send letters to her mortgage company so that her late payments won’t affect her credit.
Once she finds out that her life was turned upside down because of your business, she vows never to come back and tells all her friends to avoid your establishment.
While upgrading your equipment to EMV compliance may seem frustrating, you can now see the greater frustration, pain, embarrassment, and time that a security breach will cost your customers. Just one instance can tarnish your image and create a public relations nightmare.
At AVPS, we specialize in credit card processing risk management solutions and we want to help you protect your customers and your business from fraud. To learn more about EMV-compliant processing, contact a representative today.
