Contactless card payments have allowed shoppers to quickly spend small amounts of money in-store without having to enter a PIN or sign their name on a receipt. When contactless was first introduced in 2007, credit and debit card owners could only spend a maximum of £ 5 – with anything beyond that requiring the more secure chip and PIN handling.
Since then, that contactless limit has slowly increased up to £ 10 and then doubled before an update in 2020 allowed shoppers to make purchases up to a maximum of £ 45. That may sound like a lot of money, but it’s nothing when you see what’s next. Starting in October, you can spend £ 100 on contactless technology. No PIN, no signature … just tap and go.
That means anyone can enter a store with your card and purchase up to £ 100 worth of products without the need for any form of security. When contactless payment was first introduced, credit and debit card owners were assured that if their card was stolen, they could only make small payments before calling the bank and blocking the card. With the limit approaching £ 100, the difference of a few hours between finding out you don’t have your card and calling the bank to release the block could be thousands of pounds.
This update is designed to make things like weekly checkout purchases faster. Chancellor Rishi Sunak says: “The increase in the contactless limit will make it easier than ever to pay safely and securely.”
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However, experts warn that criminals could take advantage of the new rules and make bank card theft even more tempting. A recent report from UCL’s Jill Dando Institute of Security and Crime Science stated, “Debit and credit cards are high risk targets for employment crime.
“Raising the contactless card limit to £ 100 would likely make card theft more attractive and would increase a wide range of occupational offenses including wallet and wallet theft, robbery, and break-ins in homes and vehicles to find cards that could be fraudulently used. “
Given concerns about the £ 100 limit, some consumers might now be tempted to switch to services like Apple and Google Pay.
Payments made through these platforms must be verified using biometric data such as face and fingerprint recognition. This means that cards cannot be used without the owner present. Whenever you try to buy something from your iPhone or Android device, you will immediately see a message asking you to confirm that you have actually made the purchase.
On the iPhone, this is done by Apple’s Face ID facial recognition sensor (the Touch ID fingerprint on the iPhone SE), while on Android devices, a fingerprint must be verified before funds are withdrawn from an account.
Because of these additional safeguards, manufacturers such as Apple and Google do not impose a strict upper limit on the amount of money that can be paid wirelessly. In fact, it is possible to spend huge sums of money through these services without ever reaching for your wallet.
Anyone who is concerned about the new £ 100 limit should definitely consider using phone payments as they are far more secure.
Contactless technology has been widely adopted by consumers in recent years, and most stores are now offering it as an option. Last year, 41 percent of all card transactions were contactless. After some restrictions were lifted, the total value of contactless payments in the UK rose 16 percent in October year over year.
