FINANCIAL institution staff and business leaders expect a relatively smooth transition when signature authorisations on credit cards are phased out this Friday.
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Orange Credit Union retail services manager Glenn Tracey said less than 7 per cent of its customers’ active cards did not have PINs activated.
“Most people carry more than one card, so they’ve always got a fallback,” he said.
“It’s no different to eftpos, which has been using PINs for years.
“It’s gotten a fair bit of publicity, plus we put it in our members’ newsletter and sent direct mail to people who we know have a card who haven’t used a PIN.”
Despite some concerns raised in recent days about the ability of some older people to remember a PIN, Mr Tracey said the option to choose a PIN could help their memories.
“Obviously, they shouldn’t choose a date of birth or four of the same number that someone could guess,” he said.
Mr Tracey said, depending on the lender, customers should be able to nominate a PIN in person before Friday.
“We can issue our customers a PIN within a few minutes, obviously they will have to identify themselves,” he said.
Orange Business Chamber president Tony Healey said there might be some early confusion, but business people were happy with the measure due to additional security and efficiency.
“It’s mainly up to the customer to be informed about using a PIN,” he said.