On 16 Apr, 16:33, "Graham Harrison"
wrote:

I've just been in New Zealand where I got totally confused. * I have a chip
and pin card. * They would swipe it and the machine would usually say
something to the effect of "insert the chip". * They did that and then
sometimes it would ask for my pin and others print something for me to sign.
On the odd occasion when it didn't tell them to insert the chip it would
usually print for me to sign but occasionally it would ask for my pin! * The
local system seems to be no chip plus pin. * On the one occasion when
someone couldn't grasp the chip and pin idea I asked them nicely to phone
their authorisation centre and after a bit of "don't know how to do that"
they did, got an explanation and accepted the card.

If there are any problems I always ask the retailer to call the acquirer to
ascertain the answer - works every time.

I have some chip cards and some swipe cards, but in Italy the
transition to chip & pin has not even started. So when I come to the
UK and I give my chip card, most retailers give me automatically the
pinpad...but then the machine prints out the slip to be signed :-)