Subject: Re: Advance travel info for IETF-78 Maastricht

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 31 Mar 2010 20:56:49 -0400

In theory it is possible to use a US issued credit card in Europe.

In practice, forget it unless you are willing to face the
embarrassment of 50% of places declining your card.

My experience in the UK is that outside London you are very likely to
find that the only cards they accept are chip and pin cards.

Now according to the VIsa and Mastercard agreements, this should not
be the case. Only the UK banks could not care less what Visa and
Mastercard want, they have zero intention of enforcing the requirement
on merchants. They are fed up with the fact that the US banks refusal
to deploy chip and pin means that they still face serious fraud losses
C&P has eliminated for card present transactions in the UK.

The attack presented by Ross Anderson is interesting, but fixable. The
hard part was insisting that everyone would use chips. As with SSL
2.0, the protocol has holes. They will be fixed. Meanwhile US cards
have no security at all.

I have a UK card just so I can spend money in the UK.

---

From: Iljitsch van Beijnum <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 20:07:32 +0200

> embarrassment of 50% of places declining your card.

:-)

What you have to remember is that in many European countries, including the Netherlands, there is no tradition of credit card use. Rather, people use debit cards. Of course restaurants, hotels etc that cater to tourists accept them, and these days more places that sell expensive items do as well. But I would be very surprised to find a super market in the Netherlands that accepts credit cards. And credit cards are also not universally accepted in restaurants (the bigger / more expensive, the more likely they accept credit cards). So you really need to carry enough cash to at least pay for a meal and a train ticket or taxi ride. You can find ATMs with the Maestro and Cirrus logos all over the place, so this shouldn't be a problem. (Although because of lack of regulations that forbid this, you're likely to pay a hefty commision for cash withdrawals and of course your bank has to allow them.)

> find that the only cards they accept are chip and pin cards.

I don't think places in the Netherlands that accept credit cards require a chip, mine didn't have one until last year. Without having been able to test this, I'd say that in any place that accepts credit cards in the Netherlands (logos on the window) you should be ok: since Dutch don't use them much and rarely if ever depend on them, places that accept them do so mainly for the convenience of international travelers. Also note that the most widely accepted credit card type is Mastercard, followed by Visa. With other cards, your milage may vary even more.

> I have a UK card just so I can spend money in the UK.

Even when traveling in the EU with a card from a different EU country you can encounter refusals in non-tourist places, but at least when it works the charges (if any) are reasonable. (In fact I can withdraw money for free from all Spanish ATMs with my Dutch debit card but with the Spanish one, ATMs from banks other than my own cost me 50 cents.)

---

From: Joe Abley <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 1 Apr 2010 18:31:10 -0400

> find that the only cards they accept are chip and pin cards.

I travel somewhat frequently through Asia, Europe, Africa and Australasia with credit cards issued by US institutions (Bank of America Visa, American Express) and Canadian banks (TD Canada Trust, CIBC, Desjardins, all Visa cards). The Desjardins card is the only one with a chip.

I occasionally find that people don't take American Express. This happens more often outside North America, but not only outside North America. I have found that in some countries (UK included) people are unfamiliar with cards that don't have a chip, but it has never stopped me from using one. (In New Zealand it seems more common that people are confused about chip cards, since the EFTPOS terminals support them but very few people have them).

I have never had a problem with any of my North American cards being declined, chip or not. I have spent a reasonable amount of time in the UK in particular, since most of my family lives there. I was most recently there in December 2009.

Your comments above do not match my experience in the slightest.

Joe

---

From: "Andrew G. Malis" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 08:11:41 -0400

I'm with Joe on this. I also travel extensively, including in
non-tourist areas, and have never had my US Visa or Mastercard
declined because it didn't have a chip.

Cheers,
Andy

On Thu, Apr 1, 2010 at 6:31 PM, Joe Abley <[email-masked]> wrote:
> _______________________________________________
> Ietf mailing list
> [email-masked]
> https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/ietf
>

---

From: "Adrian Farrel" <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 13:44:31 +0100

Weeeeell,

I was living in France in spring 2005 when the chip and pin systems went 
live there.
There was a very short period where cards without chip and pin did not work.

Two days later, facing the inability to take money from foreigners, 
signature-based transactions were back.

Sometimes (including in the UK) the shop-owner may sigh in a dramatic way as 
they reach for the pen, but money is money!

Adrian
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Andrew G. Malis" <[email-masked]>
To: "Joe Abley" <[email-masked]>
Cc: "Phillip Hallam-Baker" <[email-masked]>; <[email-masked]>
Sent: Friday, April 02, 2010 1:11 PM
Subject: Re: Advance travel info for IETF-78 Maastricht

>> I travel somewhat frequently through Asia, Europe, Africa and Australasia 
>> with credit cards issued by US institutions (Bank of America Visa, 
>> American Express) and Canadian banks (TD Canada Trust, CIBC, Desjardins, 
>> all Visa cards). The Desjardins card is the only one with a chip.
>>
>> I occasionally find that people don't take American Express. This happens 
>> more often outside North America, but not only outside North America. I 
>> have found that in some countries (UK included) people are unfamiliar 
>> with cards that don't have a chip, but it has never stopped me from using 
>> one. (In New Zealand it seems more common that people are confused about 
>> chip cards, since the EFTPOS terminals support them but very few people 
>> have them).
>>
>> I have never had a problem with any of my North American cards being 
>> declined, chip or not. I have spent a reasonable amount of time in the UK 
>> in particular, since most of my family lives there. I was most recently 
>> there in December 2009.
>>

---

From: Julian Reschke <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 14:56:54 +0200

On 02.04.2010 14:44, Adrian Farrel wrote:
> Sometimes (including in the UK) the shop-owner may sigh in a dramatic
> way as they reach for the pen, but money is money!
> ...

The more tricky part are cases where there's nobody around to check a 
signature (ticket machines in Stockholm come to mind).

Best regards, Julian

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 08:59:22 -0400

> declined because it didn't have a chip.

At Point of Sale (e.g., restaurants, hotels, stores), no.

At automated kiosks, yes. If the machine asks for a PIN in my
experience my card will be declined, even if I enter my US PIN.

Regards
Marshall

>> I travel somewhat frequently through Asia, Europe, Africa and  
>> Australasia with credit cards issued by US institutions (Bank of  
>> America Visa, American Express) and Canadian banks (TD Canada  
>> Trust, CIBC, Desjardins, all Visa cards). The Desjardins card is  
>> the only one with a chip.
>>
>> I occasionally find that people don't take American Express. This  
>> happens more often outside North America, but not only outside  
>> North America. I have found that in some countries (UK included)  
>> people are unfamiliar with cards that don't have a chip, but it has  
>> never stopped me from using one. (In New Zealand it seems more  
>> common that people are confused about chip cards, since the EFTPOS  
>> terminals support them but very few people have them).
>>
>> I have never had a problem with any of my North American cards  
>> being declined, chip or not. I have spent a reasonable amount of  
>> time in the UK in particular, since most of my family lives there.  
>> I was most recently there in December 2009.
>>

---

From: Stefan Winter <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 15:05:52 +0200

Hi,

> signature (ticket machines in Stockholm come to mind).

While we are on anecdotal notes on the b0rken CC system, here's one from
Germany:

Signature-based CCs were - and are - rather popular here. The Chip+PIN
system was introduced anyways, which is arguably a good thing. My bank
wrote me a nice letter that Chip+PIN "had to" be put on my new card, but
to ensure that I can use the card in the more convenient (WTH?) way of
signing, it had been configured to offer POSes both options, but
defaulting to signature.
This makes sure that
a) I use signature next to everywhere, which makes me forget the
nevertheless existing PIN
b) if some POS understands enough handshaking to choose between the two
and use Chip, I'm lost because I forgot it
c) if some POS insists on Chip+PIN but does not understand enough
handshaking to recognise that there is more than the "default" sig
method on the card, I won't get service. Due to that, I can not use any
automatic-payment refueling stations in Luxembourg, nor rent a bike
("Veloh!") in Luxembourg City. Or train ticketing machines in the UK.

I'm delighted. Thanks, financials!

That's it for the rant of the day, happy Easter!

Stefan Winter

-- 
Stefan WINTER
Ingenieur de Recherche
Fondation RESTENA - Réseau Téléinformatique de l'Education Nationale et de la Recherche
6, rue Richard Coudenhove-Kalergi
L-1359 Luxembourg

Tel: +352 424409 1
Fax: +352 422473

---

From: Ole Jacobsen <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 07:17:58 -0700 (PDT)

> experience my card will be declined, even if I enter my US PIN.

I have had that happen too. The last time was with an NSB train ticket 
machine in Lillestrøm. This was a regular non-chip MasterCard and when
I later asked the card company about this they told me "the machine
probably did not recognize your card properly". If you are actually
BUYING stuff, then entering the US PIN is futile since it is not set
up to do anything beyond giving you a cash advance.

Ole

---

From: Basil Dolmatov <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 18:53:42 +0400

> declined because it didn't have a chip.
In Amsterdam there are shops (e.g. nice cheese shop ;) ) which accept 
only local chip cards.
At the same time a lot of other shops (on Kalverstraat ;) ) accepts all 
kind of cards provided you have an ID.

dol@

---

From: Ralph Droms <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 16:56:25 -0400

So, with all this discussion, I'm still not clear what to expect.   
When I walk up to a train ticket kiosk in Schiphol, should I expect to  
be able to use my US-issued, non-chip credit card (AMEX, VISA - I  
don't care as long as *one* of them works), or should I have a fistful  
of Euros handy?

- Ralph

---

From: Marshall Eubanks <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 17:25:37 -0400

On Apr 2, 2010, at 4:56 PM, Ralph Droms wrote:

> When I walk up to a train ticket kiosk in Schiphol, should I expect  
> to be able to use my US-issued, non-chip credit card (AMEX, VISA - I  
> don't care as long as *one* of them works), or should I have a  
> fistful of Euros handy?
>

We need ground truth here - last time I was in Paris, I needed cash to  
get a metro ticket - none of my cards worked. At 10:00 AM on a Sunday,  
it was pretty inconvenient to find an open Bureau de Change.

Marshall

---

From: todd glassey <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 14:31:38 -0700

On 4/2/2010 1:56 PM, Ralph Droms wrote:
> So, with all this discussion, I'm still not clear what to expect.  When
> I walk up to a train ticket kiosk in Schiphol, should I expect to be
> able to use my US-issued, non-chip credit card (AMEX, VISA - I don't
> care as long as *one* of them works), or should I have a fistful of
> Euros handy?

One thing you can do is buy a pre-paid debit card when you get there if
you want. Many stores have them in the EU as well so...

Todd

---

From: Chris Elliott <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 17:33:48 -0400

Yes. Expect them to work and bring cash!

That said, some of us with American cards will be arriving the Tuesday  
before. I'll post the results of our travels and trials .

Chris.

--
Chris Elliott

---

From: Joel Jaeggli <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 15:17:46 -0700

> it was pretty inconvenient to find an open Bureau de Change.

Somehow, most of us managed to make it to make it to stochholm, dublin
prague and paris, without becoming wildly lost or destitute along the
way, and that's not even mentioning the locations that I find generally
inhospitable like anaheim, minneapolis, chicago, san diego and dallas
that we all somehow coped with.

you'd  think for all at winging about payment system failure on this
list that we're going to rwanda not holland.

fwiw Nederlandse Spoorwegen says they accept credit cards and I've done
that alibiet not in the last year at a kiosk in the airport. They also
have a ticket counter...

---

From: Bob Hinden <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 15:25:09 -0700

Ralph,

On Apr 2, 2010, at 1:56 PM, Ralph Droms wrote:

> So, with all this discussion, I'm still not clear what to expect.  When I walk up to a train ticket kiosk in Schiphol, should I expect to be able to use my US-issued, non-chip credit card (AMEX, VISA - I don't care as long as *one* of them works), or should I have a fistful of Euros handy?
> 

I propose that we identify someone, everyone send them our credit cards, they fly to AMS, and try to buy train tickets with our credit cards, and report back.  Then we will know for sure.

Bob

p.s I wish I had sent this yesterday.

p.p.s. Today's answer, your credit cards are likely to work, but it is also a good idea to have some euros.

---

From: Hadriel Kaplan <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 18:46:39 -0400

Not to belabor this thread, but...
I was in Schiphol the week before IETF Anaheim and bought a train ticket.  *None* of the my cards worked (Amex, Visa, Mastercard, and a debit, and yes I tried all of them).  In fact, not only did they not work at the machines, but they were not accepted at the human-based ticket counter either, despite my having a Passport and one of the cards even has my picture on it.  They had a sign even warning that it wouldn't work without a "PIN".  It was cash only, but there is an ATM near by.  I travel a lot and was quite surprised.

-hadriel
p.s. on the other hand they have excellent licorice and hagelslag. :)

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email-masked] [mailto:[email-masked]] On Behalf Of
> Ralph Droms
> Sent: Friday, April 02, 2010 4:56 PM
> To: IETF Discussion

---

From: Dave CROCKER <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 02 Apr 2010 16:02:05 -0700

> p.s. on the other hand they have excellent licorice and hagelslag. :)

You could pay with licorice?

Did they make change with fennel?

d/
-- 

   Dave Crocker
   Brandenburg InternetWorking
   bbiw.net

---

From: Hadriel Kaplan <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 2 Apr 2010 19:09:32 -0400

> From: Dave CROCKER [mailto:[email-masked]]
> Sent: Friday, April 02, 2010 7:02 PM
> To: Hadriel Kaplan
> 

Don't be silly - they have licorice coins that "drop" out.

-hadriel

---

From: Theodore Tso <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 3 Apr 2010 06:48:48 -0400

> I was in Schiphol the week before IETF Anaheim and bought a train ticket.  *None* of the my cards worked (Amex, Visa, Mastercard, and a debit, and yes I tried all of them).  In fact, not only did t…

This was my experience as well (I travel a lot, to many countries in Europe and Asia, and have never had a problem until I travelled to the Netherlands last year) --- except my ATM card didn't work, either.   When I talked to my bank, they told me it was because of fraud problems in that country specifically; I would have needed to warn them at least a few days in advance i was planning on visiting the Netherlands for them to put my card on a special authorization list.  

Maybe all of my credit card providers (Amex, Chase, Citigroup, etc.) are losers (actually, the problem with Amex was that the train station didn't accept it, not that my Amex card didn't work.   Ultimately Amex was the only card that worked for me, and I ended up getting a cash advance using my Amex card), but if I were you, I'd bring Euros, and make sure you inform your bank and credit card issuers in advance.   I've never needed to do this before when traveling to other countries, and I've never had trouble getting local currency out of an ATM machine, so I had gotten complacent....

-- Ted

---

From: Dean Willis <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Apr 2010 01:35:46 -0500

> don't care as long as *one* of them works), or should I have a  

My US-issued Visa, Mastercard, Amex, Visa Debit, and Mastercard Debit  
cards did not work at the automated kiosk in Schiphol last summer. I  
was able to use the attended desk with a US credit card. I was also  
able to use a US credit card at the Amsterdam local transit sales  
counter/

  I was also able to withdraw Euros using my ATM (US debit) cards at  
every location I tried.

--
Dean

---

From: Scott Brim <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 2010 09:35:16 -0400

Theodore Tso allegedly wrote on 04/03/2010 06:48 EDT:
> When I talked to my bank, they told me it was because of
> fraud problems in that country specifically; I would have needed to
> warn them at least a few days in advance i was planning on visiting
> the Netherlands for them to put my card on a special authorization
> list.

Could someone verify that they HAVE warned their bank and successfully
used credit cards at Schiphol?  That that was the issue?

(I've gotten cash at Schiphol but never bought a train ticket)

---

From: Mike Tibodeau <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 2010 09:40:35 -0400

Last time I was there you could *not* use a non-chip credit card
at the train kiosks, but you could use a non-chip card in general
at manned stores/vendors.

---

From: Dmitry Burkov <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:15:47 +0400

> at manned stores/vendors.

During last year I had no any problem with usage of Visa and Mastercard 
non-chip credit and debit cards at the Schiphol's train kiosks.
You still need PIN.
Before sometimes it was a problem at the Amsterdam Central Station.

Dima

---

From: Phillip Hallam-Baker <[email-masked]>
Date: Sat, 3 Apr 2010 13:44:45 -0400

This is the main change from the US. In the US it is entirely
practical to carry only plastic and no cash at all. There are more
purchases that are impossible with cash than a card - try buying a car
with cash and see what happens.

In most of Europe you have a high probability of being able to use a
card, but you really don't want to ever get into a situation where
your cash reserves are lower than the price of a taxi fare plus a
railway ticket.

On the plus side, there are subway stops where you can buy a beer from
the kiosk on the platform.

On Fri, Apr 2, 2010 at 5:33 PM, Chris Elliott <[email-masked]> wrote:
>> So, with all this discussion, I'm still not clear what to expect.  When I
>> walk up to a train ticket kiosk in Schiphol, should I expect to be able to
>> use my US-issued, non-chip credit card (AMEX, VISA - I don't care as long as
>> *one* of them works), or should I have a fistful of Euros handy?
>>
>> - Ralph
>>

-- 
-- 
New Website: http://hallambaker.com/
View Quantum of Stupid podcasts, Tuesday and Thursday each week,
http://quantumofstupid.com/

---

From: "Polk, William T." <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 5 Apr 2010 10:03:58 -0400

I had the same experience last summer.  Lacking euros, I needed to find a teller to get on the train at Schipol.

Tim

On 4/5/10 9:40 AM, "Mike Tibodeau" <[email-masked]> wrote:

---

From: Jari Arkko <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 06 Apr 2010 12:55:36 +0300

Phillip,

> practical to carry only plastic and no cash at all.

This is mostly right, but maybe not universally true. Imagine my 
surprise when I walked to a cab at LAX and asked to be taken to the 
Anaheim hotel. First, I had apparently not read enough 77attendees list 
to realize that its a LONG way from the airport. Second, the cab refused 
to take credit cards. I had cash, of course. I was already under the 
impression that paying cabs with cash is necessary in the US. But it 
took a big dent to my cash reserves.

Lessons: 1) its useful to be aware of where you are going and what form 
of transport is appropriate 2) you always need cash, no matter where you 
go. If its not the cab its the coke machine, train or something else.

Jari