PRINCETON JUNCTION, N.J.—More than half of U.S. merchants are now chip-enabled at the point of sale.
That finding is from the U.S. Payments Forum’s spring 2017 market snapshot, which provides an update on the status of the U.S. EMV chip migration.
The migration to EMV chip technology in the U.S. is making continued progress, with solid merchant enablement growth since the Forum’s last snapshot, the group stated.
“New data from The Strawhecker Group shows 52% of merchants today are enabled to accept chip payments, 36% have contactless-capable terminals, and 28% of those contactless-capable terminals are activated to accept contactless cards. With regard to chip card issuance, Glenbrook Partners recently reported that 63% of all cards in the market are chip cards, with 81% of credit cards and 46% of debit cards converted to chip. To continue the forward momentum, the U.S. Payments Forum will continue to prioritize providing implementation guidance and best practices to merchant segments – such as petroleum and hospitality – that have unique needs and challenges in their migrations to chip,” the Payments Forum said.
Turing to card not present fraud, Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the U.S. Payments Forum, said, “Some of the reports of large rises in CNP fraud seem to be conflating consumer perception of fraud with actual fraud data. It’s important to understand all of the factors at play with what’s happening with CNP fraud in the U.S. There is the steady progress of the chip migration, which is closing off the card-present channel for fraudsters. At the same time, growth in transaction volumes in e- and m-commerce channels is accelerating. So while industry data and corresponding media reports are stating an overall rise in CNP fraud, what we are actually seeing is that the overall proportion of CNP fraud is actually staying relatively even – and perhaps even decreasing – as a percentage of online sales.”
Vanderhoof added that it “remains critical for merchants and issuers to stay vigilant against fraud in all channels, and to that end the U.S. Payments Forum is working to provide the industry with the best available knowledge on how they can implement CNP prevention measures, and at the same time work to prevent fraud at the point of sale.”