Mastercard, Visa, Discover, and American Express all announced a few months ago that signatures will no longer be required at store checkouts in the US beginning April 2018. These changes go into effect tomorrow for Mastercard, as per this press release. Discover and American Express are reported as making the change today as well, while Visa will institute the switch sometime later this month.
In reality, it’s up to the stores whether or not they want to collect signatures. The store might decide they want to continue with signatures – something unlikely, but the bigger issue is that the point-of-sale systems need to be updated to stop asking for signatures. I expect bigger chains to update their systems within the next month or so. Smaller stores could drag along with signatures for a while until they kick the habit.
Even payment processors could get in the way. ShopKeep and Square, two popular small business payment systems, are reported saying they do not plan to immediately update their systems to allow retailers to skip signatures, deferring until there’s a higher level of awareness about the change.
