Signature authorisation allowed?

[DannyDan]

Sometimes I eat food at supermarkets before I get to the till.
(perfectly legal)

I often bring empty wrappers to the till, being refused my payment method = a free meal or snack.

my gf does this too. It always seems a bit odd to me, i guess it's because my parents always made me pay for stuff before opening it

 

[6thElement]

I was in my local supermarket the other day when I noticed a sign saying ...

"absolutely under NO circumstances are signature authorisations to be allowed"

Is this legal?

How prominently was the sign displayed? I'd quite like to fill up a trolley then get turned away

 

[Ascendancy]

I often bring empty wrappers to the till, being refused my payment method = a free meal or snack.

No, a free visit from the police is most likely.

 

[BurningHorizons]

I think they can refuse what they like, however, when signing up to a card acceptance programme with the acquiring bank, they are bound by that agreement, and i'm sure there are some clauses in the contact about NOT declining a payment for a branded card which bears the logo of say M/C, Visa, Maestro et al, if these are included in the agreement, in favour of an alternative method of payment.

You are correct.
The supermarket in the opening post has broken the agreement between themselves and the acquirer/card schemes. Signature must still be accepted, as must the old zip zap machines.

 

[PinkPig]

I bet they're not allowed to refuse chip + signature cards. Firstly, there's absolutely no sensible reason to do so, and secondly (and importantly) some people are issued with them because of a disability that prevents them from remembering or entering a PIN number. I would imagine that refusing these cards falls foul of disability discrimination legislation. If it doesn't, then it ought to. In any case, their card system will almost certainly automatically ask for a signature (and not give any opportunity to enter a PIN) on this sort of card.

A signed payment on chip + pin card is another matter entirely, and lots of places quite legitimately refuse that sort of transaction.

 

[Dolph]

You are correct.
The supermarket in the opening post has broken the agreement between themselves and the acquirer/card schemes. Signature must still be accepted, as must the old zip zap machines.

Well, except that with the exception of the (very) rare chip and signature cards, the banks don't guarantee that they'll accept anything not put through Chip and pin.

Given that, how can they have broken agreement? Are you saying that they are bound by agreement to accept something that the banks may decline?

 

[V4NT0M]

I bet they're not allowed to refuse chip + signature cards. Firstly, there's absolutely no sensible reason to do so

By that logic there is "no sensible reason" to use chip and pin in the first place.

 

[james.miller]

the garage i used to work in stopped accepting signatures for chip and pin cards unless the cards automatically asked for a signiture which can be done (for disability reasons and such) - there simply was no option to override the pin number. This was back in 2007 by the way

 

[PhillyDee]

I would rather have a block put on the signature part. Ive been an ID theft victim myself despite shredding/destroying anything even remotly related to my house on it etc. I dont want to be able to overide the security. Why cant I have Pin or Nothing. ANYONE can forge a signature. Its printed on the back to copy from ffs.
I do agree that if people want to, let them have both or one or the other if they ask for it. Simple to do. Code on the card and remove the sig strip from the back.