Credit card PIN needed?

you can use chip/sig cards (the American standard) wherever people take the card. Some machine will take a chip/sig card notably the metro in Paris does. Otherwise mostly not. Having a pin probably doesn't work either when it is a chip/sig card as the system probably doesn't recognize the pin. There are few occasions when you need to use an automated machine with a. credit card. The metro is one. Gas pumps are another. You will have to gas up the car at stations that are manned as the pumps won't take US chip/sig cards. We travel for several weeks in France every year -- we have no trouble with using credit cards as most places you have a person doing the transaction ; they give you the receipt to sign. The biggest problem we had was with road tolls as fewer and fewer stations have manned booths and many do not take US card; some do. You find out through trial and error. We found the stations just south of Paris didn't but those in the south of France -- different companies run the booths. This of course changes all the time.

Well, its, in general, the way Cards are operated in Europe opposed to the situation in the US. I can't advise on whether this will be an issue in Paris or not, however, if you travel to Europe frequently I suggest to replace the card with a newer one.

Chip+PIN is the standard in Europe, and has been for over a decade. I cannot remember the last time I signed for a credit card purchase, I just put my card into a terminal and type in a PIN.

If you have an old fashioned card, then they have to accomodate you in different ways:
In a manned location (shop / restaurant) it is probably OK, they just use the old method and get a signature. You may find a new employee who has to ask how to do this, or a machine where the magnetic strip reader doesn't work and nobody has noticed because they so rarely use it.

In an unmanned location (ticket machine, fuelling a car, road tolls), it may ask for your PIN (if you have one), it may just let the transaction through if it is low value, or it might just refuse you.
Or it may refuse your card if it is mag strip only and the mag strip reader is not working.

Never use a credit card to get cash from an ATM. That counts as a cash advance and costs.

To add to what Tom said, cards in Europe are NOT multi-account. I have separate cards for debit and credit. So terminals do not offer a choice of accounts. You would have to ask your bank which account is the default.

To add to the confusion, I have never had to use a PIN with a credit card anywhere in Europe. Debit card at an ATM certainly, but never a credit card. I also never pay for anything with a debit card.

I'm guessing that self-service ticket machines may or may not be programed to accept Chip & Signature (no PIN) cards at the owner's risk. My recent experience was in Norway, not France, was that my Chip & Signature card was accepted by NSB (train) self-service ticket machines without PIN or signature. I was askied for a signature for the same card at staffed NSB ticket counters and elsewhere where the card machine was staffed.

Norwegian train and bus companies seem to be very sensative to on-line credit card transactions, but accept the same card when physically presented without problem.

There are a few US banks/credit unions that issue chip & PIN cards. PIN use is always required (except in the US at non EVM terminals of which there should now be very few). These cards work in the very same way as do French cards.

Most US bank issued credit cards are chip & signature. They are always accepted with a signature at manned sales locations such as hotels, retail stores, and restaurants. At locations without sales staff, such as at ticket kiosks or pay-at-the-pump fuel stations, things become less clear but how they may or may not be accepted is completely determined by the card issuing bank.

Banks typically issue credit cards with a non verification limit. Purchases below this limit, probably around $50 but it varies, do not require signature or PINs. Purchases at non-staffed locations in amounts above the non verification limit are handled in one of two ways.

1. The purchase is approved but PIN entry is required. (Even chip & signature cards can have PINs).

2. The purchase is denied by the bank.

Thus, some users may purchase fuel at pay-at-the-pump locations using chip & signature cards, other may not. Some visitors may be able to charge a Navigo with a weekly pass for 22.80€ (a charge below the no verification limit) but may not be able to purchase a monthly pass for 75.20€ (above the no verification limit) unless they have a functioning PIN.

It is actually all very simple but everything depends upon how your US bank sets up its credit cards. They are not all the same.

ATM cards work fine and have a PIN. US Chip sig cards work in some machines but to a low amount e.g. we can charge our NDs on the metro machines with no problem for a weekly pass; I could not charge them up for a monthly pass but had to go to the information clerk and have them run the crdit card and get my signature. Adding a PIN to a Chip/sig card doesn't make it a Chip/PIN card. The US banking system basically chose the obsolete system we have for reasons that have never made sense to me. One consequences; if someone steals your credit card they can run up 20K in a couple of hours where with a Chip/PIN card that would be impossible. Ask me how I know.

I have used a PIN to purchase train tickets in the UK and Italy and France and Germany from unmanned kiosks on my US issued chip & signature cards where the machine would not allow skipping the PIN entry. Yes, it was the so called "cash advance" PIN for that credit card. No, I was never charged as a cash advance for any purchase.

Having your PIN for your credit cards won't hurt and might help. No, no matter what your credit card issuer tells you, you will NEVER be charged for a cash advance when you enter your PIN to make a purchase. A cash advance is a completely different type of transaction than a purchase and the system does not confuse the two. Having a PIN to enter (or in some cases entering random 4 digits) will make the unmanned terminal happy and sometimes let the transaction complete where not having the PIN leaves you stuck and unable to move forward with the transaction.

The "floor" limit, the amount which is allowed without verification or PIN, is set by the merchant not the card issuer. It varies depending on how much risk the merchant is willing to accept, and now for chip & signature cards in the US can accept an almost unlimited amount. This was done to speed up the checkout process since chip cards tend to take a long time to get the auth back from the issuer. This concept does not carry over into Europe or other places where chip & PIN is the standard since the PIN works as the authorization in many cases.

But no matter what you do, the chance of a transaction not working with a specific card at a specific point in time still is a concern. Always have a backup card from a different account. Always have cash for a last ditch backup.

*The "floor" limit, the amount which is allowed without verification or PIN, is set by the merchant not the card issuer. *

I guess I would have to disagree to a point. The system for verification is a duel priority system, the card issuer sets what is allowed and a priority order; and then the merchant also sets what is allowed and a priority. When a transaction occurs, the two lists are compared and the highest priority common method is used.

In the case of "floor limit", I frequent the same merchant often, and use different credit cards, I have one card that I always have to sign, another I always have to enter the PIN, and two that are OK up to $25. Those same cards that are OK with no signature is fine for up to $50 in other places, but in my Grocery store I never sign for any amount on one card, but have to sign for anything over $50 on the other.

In my sampling, I guess I would have to conclude that the Card indicates whether it allows "No verification" and indicates an upper limit, the merchant decides whether they will do it and to what limit.