Contactless cards

baggers02 · 3 June 2016 at 7:59PM

I have a Club LLoyds account and my debit card is not contactless - I've been told by them this is a credit rating thing and as contactless payments can not be authorised real time there is the potential for people going overdrawn etc.

Today I received a contactless prepaid mastercard - so clearly the line about the contactless payments not being able to be authorised in real time is a bit of a porky.

So in reality is this just an excuse to offer a degraded service to customers with a lower credit rating or do the banks really have an issue doing this?

Smedders11 · 3 June 2016 at 8:10PM

Perhaps Mastercard are more willing to risk you going overdrawn?

masonic · 3 June 2016 at 8:49PM

I'm surprised they'd give you a Club Lloyds account if they had such concerns over your credit rating.

They are correct that contactless payments do not need to be authorised in real time, but neither do payments on a full debit card. I presume they didn't issue you with a Visa Electron card?

It will be interesting to see how you fare with the prepaid card and contactless. It is possible to issue a card that will not allow offline contactless transactions, but I'd think that would cause transactions to fail a lot of the time. Perhaps as Smedders says, your issuer is willing to allow offline transactions and there is therefore the possibility that you could overspend on it.

baggers02 · 3 June 2016 at 9:17PM

I didn't have any problems getting a Club Lloyds account - but the debit card was a normal one, not contact less.

It's a paddy power cash card - it allows you to draw on your paddy power account via an atm or use as a normal debit card - my point is clearly this won't allow you to withdraw more money than is in your account, but it is contactless - so there must be systems in place to authorise this prepaid debit card when a contact payment is made - if paddy power can do it, you have to wonder why Lloyds can't?

chambta · 3 June 2016 at 9:25PM

Banking with Paddy Power is the way forward then.

masonic · 3 June 2016 at 9:36PM

baggers02 wrote: »

I didn't have any problems getting a Club Lloyds account - but the debit card was a normal one, not contact less.

There are normal debit cards that are contactless and normal debit cards that are not contactless. So are you saying it is a normal debit card with embossed card details on the front that could in theory be used in an old-fashioned card imprinting machine, or with the details printed on the front for electronic use only?

If you have a full debit card, then Lloyds is taking a much bigger risk issuing you with that, since that can be used offline for transactions much bigger than £30. Possibly it can also be registered for Apple Pay and Android Pay to get contactless through your phone.

It's a paddy power cash card - it allows you to draw on your paddy power account via an atm or use as a normal debit card - my point is clearly this won't allow you to withdraw more money than is in your account,

Have you verified this? With contactless? (e.g. do a contactless transaction, walk to the nearest ATM and see if your available balance is updated - if it isn't then you could withdraw money that will be needed for that contactless transaction and hence you'd go overdrawn)

but it is contactless - so there must be systems in place to authorise this prepaid debit card when a contact payment is made - if paddy power can do it, you have to wonder why Lloyds can't?

Possibly. But if there is, as I said above, it will probably get rejected a lot. Also, online contactless transactions are slower than offline, negating the benefit. So you should do some testing to establish exactly what paddy power have issued you before jumping to conclusions about its value.

Mrs_Ryan · 3 June 2016 at 9:59PM

I have a contactless debit card on my Barclays basic account. When I accidentally used the wrong card the other day in Waitrose it declined straight away. It also updates straight away on my balance as I do usually check on Mobile Banking whether it's come off and it always does.
There's no such thing as Visa Electron anymore in the UK. Halifax, the last bank to issue them stopped and now issue Visa Debits. There are online debit cards, which essentially are Electrons under another name but even these are usually embossed- I have two online cards, with Halifax and Barclays, and both are fully embossed. My Lloyds card is an offline Chip and Sign card.

baggers02 · 3 June 2016 at 10:13PM

It's an embossed Lloyds Bank Debit card.

I was just interested as to why the paddy power card is contactless and yet is in effect a pre paid debit card while Lloyds tell me I can't have a contactless card because of the non authorisation issue and they can't authorise contactless in real time. Clearly from the post by Mrs_Ryan authorised contactless does exist with at least one main high street banks on a basic account - so maybe Lloyds don't have the infrastructure in place yet or as I said offer a degraded service to some customers using the authorisation issue as the reason.

I will do some experiments with the PP card once I have a winner lol!!

roadrunnertwozero15 · 4 June 2016 at 1:58AM

You can get a contactless card which CAN NOT send you overdrawn.

It's called an online only contactless card, and most banks even issue that with a basic account now - and you can indeed even get it on a prepaid card too!

Lloyds are just simply bone idle and can't be bothered to learn about online only contactless cards.

I sent Lloyds this message:
I have noticed that with your Lloyds Basic Bank Account, you do not offer a contactless debit card.
Firstly I would like to point out that RBS, NatWest, Nationwide, and Barclays – all offer a
contactless card with their basic accounts, recognising the increasing use of contactless payments
in the UK.
I was told by a local branch manager at Lloyds that the reason why contactless cards are not
supported on the basic account is because the contactless technology can allow you to go
overdrawn. (But so can Pay at Pump petrol stations, even though you can use the debit card which
comes with a basic account at these pumps).
I'm unhappy with the answer from Lloyds that contactless payments can allow an account to go
overdrawn.
I have a lot of experience in banking, and in the manufacturing and operational facilities of these
Visa Debit cards.
As you may be aware, a Visa Debit card can be produced in two forms... an online only card, where
every single transaction has to first be approved with the bank, to make sure there are sufficient
funds in the customers account before the payment is approved, and then there is the offline cards
– where, up to a certain pre-set amount, transactions can be approved offline – without checking
the availability of funds in the customers account beforehand, if upon acceptance there were not
enough funds – this would place the customers account into an overdraft (authorised or
unauthorised). Similar to what the differences used to be between Visa Debit and Visa Electron.
Seen as Lloyds Bank currently don't offer contactless technology on the basic bank account, I am
presuming that whoever is responsible for personal accounts and debit cards may be unaware of
the technology which is available and being implemented by your competitors in order for them to
be able to offer contactless cards to basic account holders.
As I explained above about online only and offline debit cards – the exact same principle can be
applied to contactless technology, and it already is been doing by your competitors.
You would easily be able to issue your basic account customers a contactless debit card which
requires all contactless transactions to be approved only upon confirmation of available funds in
the customers account.
To describe how this works, if a customer produced and waved their contactless debit cards –
before the transaction was authorised – a check would be made to confirm that available funds
were in the account, with the transaction being approved if so, or declined if there is insufficient
funds. This makes it no more likely to go overdrawn than if the card was just a standard non-
contactless card.
If Barclays, Nationwide, RBS, and NatWest can use this technology – so can Lloyds.
I find it greatly unfair that basic bank account holders at Lloyds are having to make do with a far
inferior product than what they'd get with your banking rivals. I strongly believe that this could be
a massive loss for Lloyds should they continue to ban basic account holders from this facility.
This could potentially mean that many basic account customers may switch to another provider
which offers them a contactless card, as more and more retailers are now taking contactless
payments – and virtually every debit and credit card is now enabled with contactless technology.

That was my letter but it's just excuse after excuse from them. Useless at Lloyds.

SuperAllyB · 4 June 2016 at 7:22AM

Not having a go at this thread alone, as there are numerous similar, but why are people so adamant that banks have to offer this, or offer that, or do this or do that. They're businesses, it is their prerogative to offer whatever products they like in the same way that it is your prerogative to move your accounts elsewhere.

bigadaj · 4 June 2016 at 7:39AM

SuperAllyB wrote: »

Not having a go at this thread alone, as there are numerous similar, but why are people so adamant that banks have to offer this, or offer that, or do this or do that. They're businesses, it is their prerogative to offer whatever products they like in the same way that it is your prerogative to move your accounts elsewhere.

I agree with your sentiment but there could be a view that lloyds along with rbs aren't really independent companies as they had to be bailed out by the taxpayer, not an excuse for the muddled thinking abive but a consideration.

The big banks all offer basic accounts, which are only available where normal accounts aren't possible due to credit issues, and they do vary so there are indeed options for people who do have financial issues. The problem is that many people only look,for account benefits after opening them, rather than researching their best options prior to starting, a variation on buyers regret.

Contactless cards

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