Majority of Retailers are not using the New Credit Card Technology

• By Sydny Shepard
• Nov 02, 2015

The newest technology is upon us. Banks are in the midst of one of the biggest changes we have seen in regards to protecting the user from fraud.  While banks are doing everything they can to ensure your data stays safe from breach, there are some retailers that refuse to acknowledge the new system as of recently.

While some of the biggest retailers have adopted the new EVM credit cards, like Target and Wal-Mart, they only account for a third of merchants. Analysts predict that the number of retailers using the new technology will not pick up until next year.

Part of the reason for the slow transformation is timing. The banks decided that October 1 would be the soft deadline to change over debit and credit cards to the chipped version. This date signifies something a little different for most stores: holiday season. To implement a change like this in the midst of Black Friday and Christmas shopping seems a little daunting to most.

We’ve seen the confusion happen at the registers of Target and Wal-Mart as consumers fumble with cards and quickly try to figure out how long they have to wait with their card “dipped” half-way into a card reader before they can escape from the sighs of the rushed customers behind them. Most retailers don’t want to have to deal with the longer lines and aggression that will come from changing the familiar way we pay for our goods during the jolly shopping season.

Credit and debit cards are likely to be a big deal for the holidays, with 76.4 percent of consumers saying cards are their primary payment method, split about equally between debit and credit cards, according to the latest National Retail Federation numbers from 2014.

Remember shoppers, if you become frustrated enough with your chipped card, there is always Apple Pay, Android Pay and Samsung Pay.