Bicycles are my preferred form of transportation so I was eager to explore London using the Barclay’s-sponsored bike share program. Unfortunately, you need a Chip & PIN card to rent a bike using the automated stands and all I have are U.S. issued mag stripe cards. I was foiled:
After I tweeted about my disappointment (above) a number of payment geek friends offered to help me out (including Frank Mastrangelo at Bancorp who offered to issue everyone at Glenbrook a Chip & PIN prepaid card for travel).
Locally, here in London Dave Birch of Consult Hyperion (payments professional #2) came to the rescue and gave me a prepaid card of his own, kindly loaded with a bicycle budget. But when I went to use it I realized that I didn’t ask Dave for the PIN (or if he told me I promptly forgot it!).
Luckily I was with Chris Jones of PSE (payments professional #3) and he has an annual membership in the bicycle scheme. So he simply inserted his little key fob and off I went:
After a flurry of emails with Dave I did eventually get the PIN for his card and was able to hire a bike to get to my meetings in the City of London later in the afternoon.
This little cycling fable illustrates a troubling breakdown of the International card brand promise, something we’ve explored previously on Payments Views (here). And it wasn’t just bicycle hires – I wound up getting cash from the ATM and using it to buy tube tickets and train tickets (rather than wait in the long queues at Waterloo to pay a person at the counter with my mag stripe card). As a result I now have a huge handful of very heavy British coins that I received as change from the ticket machines.
I realize that the US is planning to move to EMV. But when we do eventually shift over to EMV, we’ll be using a combination of Chip & PIN and Chip & Signature (it’s up to the Issuers) so I am not entirely sure that this problem will be resolved. Just in case, I’m going to take Frank at Bancorp up on his offer.
During her time at Glenbrook, Erin focused on client engagements in business payments, cross-border transactions, bill payment, and the intersection of corporate finance, banking, and ERP/accounting. She has nearly twenty years of experience leading increasingly complex payment initiatives for corporate clients and advising financial institutions and payment technologists on the development of their payment capabilities.
Erin is also the founder of Forte Financial, a consulting firm focused on corporate finance efficiency, technology, and process improvement. She is a past president of the Financial Women’s Association of San Francisco and also a two-term past president of the San Francisco Treasury Management Association. Erin is no longer with Glenbrook, but contributed greatly during her time at the firm.