Signature no longer required by Visa, Mastercard, Discover, and AMEX

[Diy]

All the major card brands have announced that they will no longer require merchants obtain a signatures on chip transactions.  Major retailers such as Target and Walmart have already begun eliminating the necessity.  Some other major chains have kept their signture requirments, but has greatly increased when it gets triggered, some have it set at $50 and even others over $100.

My question is does square have plans to eliminate this need as well?  Can we have  a field to create a custom amount when the signature is required? I.E. now it is a toggle over $25, but maybe let the retailer decide where to set the limit?

If we choose to not collect a signature on a transaction, and there happens to be a chargeback does that effect chargback protetion?

Will square be changing their chargeback policy to address the new signature non regualtion by the card brands?

[EJ_]

Hi @Diy

We haven't made any changes as of yet, but I can see how it could be beneficial for sellers to skip the signatures or customize when it's required. 

A lot of these questions are being discussed currently, and as soon as we have an update we'll share it out with everyone. 

I brought your suggestion up to our Checkout team, so hopefully they'll get back to me and provide more details around the direction we're heading in the future. 

[TheDC]

Yes, please either raise limit or eliminate requirement. Its tedious, not mention a little germy...

[neutral]

Please do not eliminate the OPTION to require signature. Many fast food service employees get tips via credit card, if not having the option to ask customer to tip and sign, tips will eventually be elminated for the employees.

Please leave it as is and grant permission to raise or lower the requirement.

[iloaders]

Please leave an option to varify the transaction and given an option to tip.

[E3357A]

Please leave it up to the businesses to opt out/in for requiring signatures and what the minimum requirement is for signature.  

[Lbcoats]

Please allow businesses the option to keep having customers sign for purchases. It’s one of the last lines of defense we have to fight “buyers remorse” 

[ashc]

@Lbcoats Sorry for the confusion here. Turning off the signature is totally optional so we're not taking away that option but I'd recommend checking out my above comment to @crystalimages as well for more information on the best kind of signatures to have if a dispute occurs. 

[crystalimages]

I'm seeing several threads related to this one, but none are giving me a direct answer. 

I would prefer to turn off signatures, at least during the covid-19 situation.

However, I have the concern others have raised about how this affects the seller if there's a charge-back or dispute. I have yet to have a charge-back in 2 years, but our sales are rarely under $100, and can go up to $600 or more. If customers see I'm not requiring signatures, I would hate for that to be an incentive for them to begin a dispute.

If we choose not to collect signatures, especially during covid-19, are we at a greater risk of losing a dispute? Since the major cards aren't requiring it anymore, I don't see how they could say we should have done it, but what would Square's stance be?

We do use the chip dip about 95% of the time, so I know we're covered for the most part. Most other transactions are invoices.

I guess our business has a bit of an advantage since we are selling photos and generally the people buying them are in the photos... so there's proof they were present... but I feel a little uneasy about taking that step to ignore the signature. 

[ashc]

Hey @crystalimages,

Wanted to answer some of your questions for ya since I have experience on the Disputes team here at Square.

To be transparent, a digital signature doesn't hold up much when challenging a dispute. Signatures on contracts with terms stated on them are going to hold up way more when you go to challenge a dispute so turning off your signatures through Point of Sale won't hurt to do since the card companies listed don't require them.

[crystalimages]

Thank you for the assurance. Much appreciated!

[AdamB · Accepted solution]

Hi everyone! In case you didn't see it, we now no longer require signatures by default. As @ashc said in another comment on this thread, digital signatures are not essential these days to win chargebacks. However, you can toggle this on in Settings > Checkout > Signature and Receipt within the Square Point of Sale app.