Many Consumers Scratch Out the Signature Requirement on Cards

Fourty-four percent of American consumers have chosen not to sign the back of their payments cards, instead writing “see ID” or leaving it blank, according to a study sponsored by Jumio and conducted online by Harris Interactive.

One possible reason for this tactic is to require merchants to verify their identities, but 87% of respondents report that in most cases, they are not asked for an ID.  Harris surveyed 2,022 U.S. adults in September.

“The liability isn’t with the merchant, so there’s not a terribly strong incentive to ask for identity other than it keeping chargebacks below the threshold that would keep the card networks from dropping them (about 1%),” says Marc Barach, chief marketing and strategy officer at Jumio.

The U.S. migration to the EMV-chip card standard, which includes a liability shift for most non-compliant merchants by 2015, may change that. “Once there is a liability shift, merchants will be thinking more about this," Barach says.

Twenty-six percent of respondents reported a fraudulent charge was made to their bank account or credit card by someone else, and 29% of Americans confessed to making a purchase—either online or in person—with a friend or family member's credit or debit card, whether or not they had permission.

There’s also a wide use of fake IDs—28% say they’ve borrowed an ID from a family member or a friend; while 24% made their own fake ID and 12% had it made by someone else. 

And about a third of respondents say they’d prefer to flash a digital version of their ID on the smartphone, if that was an option. Jumio has developed technology that can perform that function, so they have a stake in those numbers. PayPal and Square incorporate photo ID as part of their digital wallets.