No Signature Required Credit Card Payment Processing Program

Visa has launched a "No Signature Required" program that makes accepting small ticket payments faster and simpler for customers and card acceptors by eliminating the need for signature for qualified transactions that are under $25.

For best results, restaurant and others who participate in the program are encouraged to implement the following best practices when doing their credit card payment processing:

If the restaurant has customer facing terminals (inside or drive-through), the following best practices should be observed:

1. Ask the customer to swipe or wave the card for a contactless payment.
2. Wait for an authorization approval.
3. If approved, continue with transaction. Note: If qualified transaction is under $25, no signature is required.
4. If it is denied, request another form of payment.
   

If the restaurant does not have customer facing terminals (inside or drive-through), the following payment processing best practices should be observed:

1. Request card from customer.
2. Swipe the card.
3. Wait for the authorization approval.
4. If approved, continue with the transaction according to your procedures. Note: if the qualified transaction is under $25, no signature is required.
5. If it is denied, request another form of payment.

How Authorizations With Tips Can Cause Lost Sales

The following actions can lead to lost sales:

• The restaurant check is for $200, but the personnel has requested authorization with estimated tip for $240.
• The cardholder's issuing bank deducts $240 from the available funds / credit. The final transaction amount, however, was $230 ($200 + $30 tip).
• The cardholder leaves a tip in cash so the sale's amount is $200.
  

When the customer views his account activity and sees a $120 hold against his account, he thinks the restaurant has overcharged him and decides never to return to this establishment again.

Here is how to avoid such situations:
Exclude the tip when authorizing transactions. An authorization approval that includes an estimated tip can end up reducing a customer's available credit line by an amount she may not recognize. This can occur when the customer leaves a tip that is different from what you've added to the authorization request, or simply leaves the tip in cash. The next thing that can happen is that you have a very unhappy customer asking why there is an overcharge, or worse yet - a customer filing a dispute with his card issuer. By not including the tip in the authorization request, you can resolve this issue and your credit card payment processing account will not suffer.

Make sure the requested transaction authorization amount is the same as the check amount. Do not include the tip amount in your authorization request. For example, if the check amount before tip is $73.82, the authorization should also be for $73.82.