US Payments Forum Publishes Best Practices for EMV Chip Fallback Transactions at the Fuel Pump

  • Jun 09, 2020

The U.S. Payments Forum is continuing to provide the United States with essential guidance on the migration to EMV chip with a new white paper on options for supporting fallback transactions in the petroleum environment. The resource released today defines fallback and covers processing magnetic stripe transactions for card programs that are not supported on the contact EMV interface of automatic fuel dispenser (AFD) terminals.

Merchants, independent software vendors, value-added resellers, acquirers and processors can access “U.S. Automated Fuel Dispenser Chip Fallback Transaction Processing Best Practices” at https://www.uspaymentsforum.org/u-s-automated-fuel-dispenser-chip-fallback-transaction-processing-best-practices/.

“Fallback transactions are considered a natural part of EMV migration as things get up and running,” said Randy Vanderhoof, director of the U.S. Payments Forum. “It’s critical that petroleum terminals can support these types of transactions, and that fuel pump owners understand what does and doesn’t qualify as a fallback. The petroleum environment has a lot of unique considerations, and the Forum has been instrumental in supporting this market – among others – with resources to support implementations of EMV which help provide clarity and guidance during this transition.”

This white paper covers:

* Definitions of fallback transactions including technical fallback, empty candidate list fallback, fallback-not-allowed scenarios and identification of fallback transactions

* Unique considerations for AFD fallback

* Payment network policies for AFD technical fallback

* Options for processing empty candidate list scenarios when the terminal is only enabled for certain EMV payment products but not yet for all magnetic-stripe-supported payment products, such as fleet payment products

This resource was developed by the U.S. Payments Forum Petroleum Working Committee. This group works collaboratively to identify, review and resolve challenges associated with implementation of EMV within the U.S. petroleum and convenience market. The Petroleum Working Committee includes payment networks, petroleum and convenience merchants, petroleum-specific acquirers, petroleum and convenience point of sale vendors and fuel dispenser manufacturers, and other organizations servicing the petroleum and convenience category.

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