From this week on, consumers can pay at the checkout per payment up to and including 50 euros without a contact code, with a bank card, smartphone or wearable.
Until now, for an amount above 25 euros, the PIN had always had to be entered on the payment terminal for contactless payment with a bank card or wearable. This so-called transaction limit is now temporarily increased to 50 euros. Consumers and entrepreneurs do not have to do anything themselves, it is introduced fully automatically.
Fight against coronavirus
For the time being, customers who make contactless payments need to touch a payment terminal less often. For example, banks and payment terminal suppliers want to contribute to the fight against the further spread of the new corona virus.
POS terminals automatically adjusted remotely
For this change in the transaction limit, roughly 380,000 Dutch payment terminals are automatically adjusted remotely. The new transaction limit is expected to be active on more than three quarters of all payment terminals on Wednesday 25 March. The limit has already been increased in almost all supermarkets and other high-traffic shops.
Sandra Molenaar, director of the Consumers' Association, is happy with the increase: “The fewer consumers have to touch a payment terminal to enter their PIN code, the better. It is important to us that the banks continue to compensate any abuse up to the higher limits. ”
Information material
“We are happy with this fast action. We are already asking customers to pin as much as possible, preferably with a contactless bank card, mobile phone or wearable ”, says Eus Peters, director of the Dutch Retail Council. "The fact that this can now also be done for larger purchases without a PIN code helps enormously." Retailers and other entrepreneurs can download information material for customers from www.pin.nl/promotiematerial/.
Cumulative limit
Another limit for contactless payment, the so-called cumulative limit, was already increased by the banks last week, from 50 euros to 100 euros. This cumulative limit applies to multiple contactless payments without a consecutive PIN code. Banks will continue to compensate for abuse of stolen or lost contactless bank cards without a PIN up to the higher limits.
Beware of fake emails, text messages, letters and phone calls, supposedly from banks!
To increase the limits for contactless payment without a PIN, consumers and retailers do not have to do anything at all! It works fully automatically for all existing bank cards, of all banks. Banks are therefore not going to send unsolicited messages or call their customers. Don't be fooled by scammers and fraudsters who take advantage of the circumstances surrounding the new coronavirus (COVID-19) to send fake emails, text messages and letters and call people.
Source: Dutch Payments Association
