Back-to-school season is often equated with deadlines. Deadlines for homework assignments. Deadlines to have permission slips signed. For those of us in the payments industry, however, a deadline on our minds is that of the October 2016 EMV ATM liability shift.
After October 1, financial institutions (FIs) processing ATM transactions for MasterCard-branded cards will be liable for any fraud occurring on chip-enabled cards at non-chip-enabled ATMs. (The deadline for Visa-branded cards is October 1, 2017.) As FIs prepare to upgrade their ATMs to meet this deadline, there are a few things they should keep in mind. Below are five key steps to readying ATMs for EMV.
- Coordinate with ATM vendor(s). Ensuring your ATM is equipped to process EMV transactions requires the appropriate hardware and software. Your ATM vendor(s) will be able to provide this.
- Initiate a project with your card issuer. TMG clients should work with their Client Business Executive or Solutions Analyst to initiate a project for implementing Application Identifiers (AIDs) at EMV-enabled ATM terminals.
- Notify front-line staff. As your staff will be the ones answering consumers’ questions, it is crucial they understand what the liability shift entails, what your FI is doing to meet the deadline and how any changes may impact consumer experiences at ATMs.
- Communicate to consumers. It is important to educate consumers on what any changes will mean for them. How will they use their EMV chip cards at ATMs? How will the new process differ from their current transaction methods? In our next blog post, we will be providing tips on prepping consumers for the EMV ATM switchover.
- Test the technology. As consumers adjust to EMV-enabled ATMs, they may tell you your ATMs are not working properly. Upon receiving any such reports, make sure to test the ATM to determine if the problem is user error-related or a true breakdown.
