Credit card PIN

You only will need a PIN if you are using an unattended vending machine, like a train ticket machine. US chip credit cards are all "signature" enabled, so when you use it at a restaurant, hotel, shop, it will print out a slip that you sign and give to the merchant, just like at home.

You typically only need to use a pin when using your card at an automated machine. For all other purchases like at a retail store, hotel, or restaurant you will sign for your charges just like in the US' no pin needed. Not knowing/having a pin number usually isn't a big deal.

Oh that's great to hear! I'm hoping my debit card with PIN would then be ok to use in the train stations, is that correct? Otherwise...do they take cash? Thanks for the reply!!

Most train stations have a ticket window where you can buy tickets. Its only out of the way stations, or outside of normal business hours that you would need to use a ticket machine. I'd avoid using a debit card for anything other than getting cash out of an ATM. And if asked, always do the transaction in Swiss Francs, avoiding Dynamic Currency Conversion. The credit card network will do the conversion at a better rate.

But please make sure the back of your card is signed, or you have an ID with you that has your signature on it. You would be amazed how often I get handed unsigned American cards, which I can not accept as I have absolutely no way of knowing that they belong to the person handing it to me. Not a risk I personally will take.

I've never needed to use my PIN, even in kiosks and ticket machines; there's a knack to these machines, be patient, and wait for the machine to skip beyond the PIN requirement...or find ticket window. I do bring my PIN for my Credit cards incase I need a cash advance, which is my ultra emergency system, but I don't expect to ever use it. So relax. Enjoy your trip, but use your debit card only in ATMs attached to a bank, if possible.

Ok great! Thank you all, I really appreciate it!

Your credit card PIN is probably just an online-only, magnetic-stripe based PIN used for debit networks (e.g., ATM machines and cash advances), not an online + offline PIN (stored in the EMV chip itself) and used for credit network transactions. Nearly all US EMV credit cards are chip-and-signature only; a few are chip-and-signature priority with an EMV PIN as the secondary validation method; and just a handful are true chip-and-PIN priority. Many unattended machines in Europe require offline EMV PINs (I've noticed that in France, Italy, and Netherlands); some will ignore the PIN (just try 0000) for small transaction amounts. See https://www.ricksteves.com/travel-tips/money/chip-pin-cards for an old article on the topic.

Many Swiss payment terminals (including vending machines) are from SIX Payment Services and now support Apple Pay, which is more secure than EMV. The SBB app is great for train tickets too.

Ok great! Good to know about Apple pay and using the app to buy train tickets. Thanks so much!