Visa Makes Signature Optional for North American Merchants

Signatures will no longer be required for North American chip-enabled merchants starting later this year, ETA member Visa announced today in a blog post.

The signature requirement will become optional for all EMV contact or contactless chip-enabled merchants in North America beginning in April, the blog post said.

“Visa is committed to delivering secure, fast and convenient payments at the point of sale,” said Dan Sanford, VP of consumer products at Visa, in the blog post. “Our focus is on continually evolving the market towards dynamic authentication methods such as EMV chip, as well as investing in emerging capabilities that leverage advanced analytics and biometrics. We believe making the signature requirement optional for EMV chip-enabled merchants is the responsible next step to enhance security and convenience at the point of sale.”

The move away from the traditional signature requirement at the point-of-sale comes as other card networks make similar announcements. In 2017, ETA members Discover Global Network, Mastercard and American Express all announced changes to their signature requirement policies. Discover Global Network announced it was dropping signature requirements for merchants in the U.S., Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean while Mastercard announced that the signature requirement was going away starting April 2018 for merchants in Canada and the U.S. And starting in April 2018, American Express will drop its signature requirement globally.

Read the full blog post here.