Hi!
At establishments like coffee shops, often a lot of time is wasted handling cash or credit card authorizations by signature.
Why not offer customers and businesses the option of participating in what you might call "Slide-N-Go"? The credit/debit card companies could authorize petty payments without the signature. To address security concerns, you could e. g. impose a limit of $10 per purchase and $30 per day. And if you're past your daily limit, that's no big deal, you can still use the classic authorization. You could put the sliding device right in front of the customer, and by the time his coffee is actually made/poured, the payment should have gone through.
F.
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Here are two thoughts on how to do it:1. A key chain card (like Mobil's E-Z pass) that you just wand through for purchases.2. In Northern Europe, your cellphone can "call" a vending machine, and pay for a soda. The key on that one would be to make it so people are punching numbers at the time of purchase, which would be slower than what we currently do.
In Toronto, Canada, we have Dexit cards - prepaid cards, just like prepaid phonecards, for small purchases (e.g. coffees shops, newspaper stores). $1 charge to refill to, say, $10 or $20 limit, at a couple of central locations.
Saves the customers the hassles of carrying cash.
But if you lose the card, it's just like losing cash. Any finder may use it.
Vendors require a special machine, rented from Dexit corp. for a small monthly fee.
Current use is limited to the busy downtown financial core.
Posting from Polohay.
Some retailers already do this. The one that comes to mind most readily is Starbuck's. Whenever I use my credit card at Starbuck's, I don't sign it. I just swipe it, then go. I agree it's great for small purchases. I wonder about the use for a large item - although I'm not sure the retailer really validates my signature anyway.