Last year, Mastercard, Visa, Discover, and American Express eliminated the requirement that customers must sign when using their credit cards. One of the drivers behind the change was providing better checkout experiences for consumers.
In a press release, Linda Kirkpatrick, executive vice president, U.S. Market Development at Mastercard, stated: “In our digital, fast-paced marketplace, consumers appreciate any opportunity to save time. This is why Mastercard led the charge to officially ‘retire’ cardholder signatures from store receipts. Merchants recognize that cardholder signatures have limited use, and are embracing this change to create efficiency for their customers.”
Although brands no longer require signatures, they left the final decision of whether a customer has to sign up to the merchant. So, what’s the right move for your business?
Is Accepting a Payment Card without a Signature Secure?
Although collecting signatures was a long-time practice to verify that the customer was an authorized cardholder, new technologies have made signatures virtually obsolete. Discover, for example, says some of the safety and security features it uses include:
- EMV chip technology that allows the card to communicate with the payment terminal. It produces a unique code for each transaction and makes it virtually impossible to counterfeit cards. Also, if a card has been reported lost or stolen, the system will know.
- Tokenization that replaces actual card data with a “token” on mobile devices so a hacker would not be able to find data they could use or sell.
- The option for cardholders to freeze accounts to prevent purchases if they can’t find their cards or if their cards are stolen.
- Daily monitoring of every purchase for every customer.
Jasma Ghai, vice president of Global Products Innovation at Discover, explained in a press release, “With the rise in new payment security capabilities, like chip technology and tokenization, the time is right to remove (the signature) step from the checkout experience.”
It’s worth pointing out that EMV chip cards only provide security to your customers and your business if you upgraded to an EMV-compliant payment solution. If you haven’t, you are taking a risk. Your business will be responsible for fraudulent charges, chargebacks, and possibly fines associated with the transactions.
Will Your Customers Be Comfortable?
Change, especially with checkout processes, may take a while for your customers to accept. When the U.S. transitioned to EMV technology, one of the decisions that the payment industry debated was whether to use “chip-and-PIN” as Europe had done or to maintain signatures as verification. Since U.S. consumer were accustomed to signing, signatures won out over PINs. So, will they be comfortable not signing during a credit card transaction now?
Some larger merchants have already eliminated the signature requirement, so it’s possible that your customers are getting used to not signing when they use their cards. And, with card brands issuing millions of contactless cards designed to allow consumers to “tap-and-go,” eliminating signatures from your card transaction process may help pave the way for more changes ahead.
The Final Decision is Yours
Card brands changed their signature policies, but that didn’t automatically change the settings on your payment solution. It’s up to you to work with your point of sale solution provider to update your system if you decide you’re ready not to require signatures for card transactions. Also, remember it doesn’t have to be “all or nothing.” You can still require customers to sign if transactions total a certain amount.
The good news is that you have the flexibility to design checkout experiences that will enhance overall shopping and dining experiences that are tailored to your customers.
Want to learn more? Contact PlazSales.
To help pizzeria owners, pizza point of sale (pizza pos) is more than just a cash register or adding machine — it’s a hub where you can manage your entire business.
Pizza shops have long managed their business in the traditional, manual manner. Much like pizza itself, why stray too far from what has worked? This may mean using pen and paper to order ingredients, taking down orders over the phone. You may be using a non-integrated payment system to swipe credit cards. But that means workflows that take extra time through a shift and at the end of the day. Modern customers want the convenience of online ordering and payment. And like customers always have, they still expect prompt service and their food served warm and tasty as ever.
With Pizza POS, you can streamline your operations to reduce waste. It’s a win for everyone: The more efficiency you can build into your business, the more successful you will be at keeping your customers and employees happier.
Pizza POS Features
Point of sale systems for pizzerias are unique among those for other restaurants and businesses because pizzerias are a different kind of operation. Pizzas are almost endlessly customizable in a way that other restaurants are not expected to deal with. How big of a pie does a customer want? Which certain toppings only go on which certain halves? It’s easy for a mix-up or misunderstanding to occur when relaying these orders verbally and recording them manually. Better to have a system that is designed and optimized for these specific kinds of orders.
Pizza POS systems need to give your business these capabilities:
- Modify options for size and toppings on pizzas. When the menu changes, the system can easily adapt as well.
- Inventory management that lets you know exactly what you have, how much you use, so you never run out of ingredients while reducing food waste.
- Online ordering to suit busy customers’ schedules and for added convenience.
- Delivery management to provide your delivery drivers with directions and constant traffic updates to get them where they need to be on time. You can also let your customers know when their delivery is dispatched so they aren’t left guessing.
- Loyalty program features to keep your customers coming back by rewarding them for doing so. The right pizza POS system will allow you to digitally manage your customer accounts and rewards with ease.
- Customer relationship management (CRM) that allows you to optimize your sales and marketing campaigns, forecast future sales, and automate simple digital features to leave your staff more time for complex tasks.
- Integrated payments — no longer take that extra time at the end of the day to do your payment reports.
- Offline mode for business continuity, even if your network connection is interrupted
- Reporting that provides you with visibility into what your customers are ordering, their preferred methods of payment, the times the rush comes in, and track labor hours and employee performance.
Just What You Ordered
In this day and age, pizzerias face steep competition and small profit margins. To keep operating while making a profit, you need the ability to operate efficiently and build a base of loyal customers. When it comes to optimizing your business, in all specifics unique to pizzerias, pizza POS can help.
To learn more about point of sale systems that help pizzerias run efficiently and profitably, contact PlazSales.
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