INTERAC Flash? Anyone heard of 'contactless flash' used in UK yet?

socks_uk

My Canadian husband and I have a joint bank account in Canada with RBC (Royal Bank of Canada) and we have just received our new bank cards that have the INTERAC Flash contactless facility.

I'm looking forward to using it when we go on holiday to Canada in December (when I've deposited my $900 holiday money into the account) but was wondering if this 'contactless flashing' system is in place anywhere over here in UK yet? It certainly isn't anywhere in my little corner of the country!

MPH80

It's a branding variation on all the contactless technology being rolled out:

http://www.barclays.co.uk/Helpsupport/Barclayscontactlessdebitcards/P1242561764200

https://www212.americanexpress.com/dsmlive/dsm/int/gb/en/personal/ourcards/contactless_cm.do?vgnextoid=26f28ffc07af0310VgnVCM40000037b3ad94RCRD

http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/media/pdfs/halifax/2007/November/11_11_07_Halifax_issues_contactless_debit_cards.pdf

socks_uk

It's interesting that the Halifax info is dated November 2007! Maybe I'll still be using it in Canada before I've used it in UK. Thanks for the info!

InsideInsurance

Not sure what darkest part of the country you are in but certainly some places have contactless payment in place, namely the large sandwich, fastfood and coffee shop chains (Pret, Eat, Starbucks, McDonalds etc) and a few Boots stores.

The store near my clients have been accepting them for at least 2 years now, still are fairly unreliable and staff dont seem to clued up on how it works etc.

socks_uk

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Not sure what darkest part of the country you are in...

Quite a good description really... Grimsby!

Plxply

InsideInsurance wrote: »

The store near my clients have been accepting them for at least 2 years now, still are fairly unreliable and staff dont seem to clued up on how it works etc.

I have the opposite problem, there are a lot of places around me that accepts contactless payments. But none of my four current accounts or credit card have contactless built in

simongregson

I find that even the stores it is set up in don't have a clue how it works. The main problem seems to be that they wait for you to insert a card into the chip and pin machine before selecting card payment on the till, so you have to actually tell them that you have a contactless card before they can activate the reader.

they need to be retrained to type the amount into the card machine rather than wait for the customer to put the card in. And stop looking at you like a wierdo if you actually want to use it.

The place I find they know exactly what they are doing is Wilkinsons, obviously they have had some training.

InsideInsurance

Did get a member of staff in McDonalds the other day saying "I wondered what they were for" and then proceeded to ask me how it works.

mgdavid

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Did get a member of staff in McDonalds the other day saying "I wondered what they were for" and then proceeded to ask me how it works.

brilliant !!
I trust you were able to explain :-)