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Walmart takes Visa to court over debit card payments
It wants to require customers to verify purchases with PINs rather than signatures.
Walmart isn't happy that Visa still allows customers to sign for purchases made with their chip-equipped debit cards. The retail giant has filed a lawsuit against Visa in New York in an effort to compel the credit card brand to require PIN verification when paying in its stores. Walmart argues that PINs are a lot more secure than signatures and can help prevent fraud. It used to only allow debit card payments verified by PINs when it first started accepting chip cards, but Visa forced the company to allow signature verifications.
According to The Wall Street Journal, debit cards are the most common form of payment at Walmart. Considering a lot of big retail stores fall prey to card breaches, making transactions more secure would benefit a lot of buyers. Company spokesperson Randy Hargrove said in a statement: "Walmart believes Visa's position creates unacceptable risk to customers and its actions and rules are inconsistent with federal law." The company does pay five cents more for every signature transaction, though, so there's definitely something in it for the retailer, as well.
