EC Kartenzahlung Störung

 

EC Card payment disruption

Nationwide disruption: Paying with a debit card is currently causing problems

If you are currently shopping, you should rely on cash in case of doubt: in some supermarkets and at gas stations, there are difficulties in processing card payments.

"Attention, an important note for you! Due to a nationwide disruption, no card payment is currently possible in our markets.

“ With this posting, the retail chain Konsum tried to reach its customers via Facebook yesterday - so that they can still insert or withdraw cash before shopping. With the failures in card payment, Konsum is not alone, in various stores there are currently problems with payment with debit, bank and credit cards.

Error when paying with debit card: fault is a software error

As Focus Online reports, the discounter Netto and the supermarket chain Edeka are affected by the disruption.

 But there are also difficulties at Aldi Süd and the drugstore Rossmann, according to the dpa. On the other hand, Aldi Süd and the Rewe Group, i.e. the Rewe, Penny and Toom Baumarkt markets, are not affected.

Whether a card payment works is apparently due to the card reader used: “Like other network operators, we are currently experiencing significant nationwide restrictions on the processing of transactions at card payment terminals of the H5000 type from the manufacturer Verifone,“ the dpa quotes the payment service provider Payone. The reason for the error is probably a certificate error within certain versions of the provided software.

According to the Federal Association of German Banks, the affected terminals account for only a small proportion of the devices used in Germany. Verifone itself describes the type H5000 on its website as the "most used terminal in Germany" – but the devices are no longer available for resale at the manufacturer.

Payment terminals cannot process data: solution search is underway

The terminals can currently read payment data, but then do not connect to the host to forward the data. According to Verifone, operators should not restart the devices independently and "leave them connected to both the power and the network unchanged".

 "A troubleshooting is already being worked on," says the software provider Huth, who, for example, manages the POS systems of many petrol stations, and the Federal Association of German Banks also promises that "intensive" work will be carried out on the correction.

Payment service provider Payone estimates to the dpa that a new software is needed to fix the error.
 However, it is unclear how long it will take for the outages to be resolved – until then, cash is the safe option so as not to have to leave the purchase or a corresponding deposit in the supermarket after all.

 

Meanwhile, there should be no problems when withdrawing cash from ATMs, after all, the difficulties in paying are not due to the debit, bank and credit cards themselves. It is also worth paying attention to appropriate signs in supermarkets or at gas stations, whether a card payment is currently not possible here.