East Midlands Chip and Pin only accepts certain cards.

[IanXC]

*This limit can be affected dynamically - e.g. your bank can change the offline transaction limit without issuing you with a new card.

Indeed, in order to get an accurate closing balance, the new Current Account Switching Service includes an expectation that the old bank will rescript the card at the start of the 7 days.

 

[SussexMan]

It shows how much the user has spent (or tried to spend) since the card was last reset. This includes offline transactions that may not have been processed yet. This information is (I assume) sent to the bank from the MacDonalds terminal in the example above, and the bank will record the value of the counter and decide whether to reset it.

So it provides some protection by limiting how much can be spent without an online authorisation - not just in a single transaction, but also in a number of small transactions.

Right, that makes sense - so Deerfold's post was incorrect and information about the offline transactions is transmitted to the bank when you next do an online transaction.

 

[Deerfold]

Right, that makes sense - so Deerfold's post was incorrect and information about the offline transactions is transmitted to the bank when you next do an online transaction.

The total, yes, but I doubt all the details of the transactions are sent.

This will allow the bank to compare the offline limit with, for example, the funds left in the account.

 

[anme]

Right, that makes sense - so Deerfold's post was incorrect and information about the offline transactions is transmitted to the bank when you next do an online transaction.

To be honest, I don't know what is stored on the card - just the total value of recent offline transactions, or details of the transactions themselves. I assume the former, but I could well be wrong. I'm not sure if there is any additional value in storing the transactions themselves, as sooner or later they will come via the normal channels, and the total spent is actually what's relevant.