Contactless bank cards

[David Walters]

On Tue, Nov 16, 2010 at 11:03 AM, Ian Batten <igb at batten.eu.org> wrote:
> On 16 Nov 2010, at 10:55, David Walters wrote:
>>  It requires a fair amount of slight of hand for the
>> customer to not spot it, especially if they need change, although they
>> are unlikely to be watching very closely.
>
> It also requires that no-one, ever, looks at receipts

I don't think many customers take receipts for small value cash
transactions. Even supermarkets [1] have stopped issuing them
automatically.

> or CCTV tapes.

I'm fairly sure those are only looked at when there is already
suspicion of a crime.

> but will no-one, at all, notice?

I think you are right that someone will notice sooner or later and
that is where having the cap on contactless transactions helps. You
can't make a perfect system but you can make one where the risks are
high enough that they outweigh the rewards. But perhaps I'm just naive
and will be very annoyed when I'm hit and the bank calls me a liar.

[1] The Sainsburys Local I sometimes buy lunch from anyway.