I am referring to contactless technology of course, and in particular the chance that your debit or credot card may be stolen and used to buy goods and services to the value of £10 without a PIN number or any identification!  This level is soon to rise to £15 also i think in the not too distant future.

If someone steals your cards and you don’t realise it until much later they could have spent an awful lot of money in various different stores before you report it missng.  It’s very important that you consider the implications of contactless technology and understand that you are at risk.  New technology like this is supposed to make life easier, instead we’re going to see an increase in card theft surely?

With contactless technology you simply have to press your card against a reader and then your transaction of up to £15 is paid and you can go on your way without entering any PIN numbers or signing anything.  This is a goldmine for any would be bag snatcher or pick pocket isn’t it?  And althoug i said that you couldn’t really cause too much damage with the contactless technology, if you have someone’s credit or debit card you can certainly visit a few shops and spend quite a lot of money before they know that you’ve taken it from them.

You simply need to look after your card even more these days.  Rather than getting more secure it appears that we are opening ourselves up for attack by theives and fraudsters all over the country; they’ll all be rubbing their hands together with glee at the prospect of contactless cards being distributed nationwide.

People who struggle to remember their PIN number for their credit card are actually deciding to write it down and keep it on their person; often in their wallet or purse!  This is of course against all the advice out there about memorising your PIN number and perhaps making it a memorable number to you so that you can’t forget it.

It is surprising how many people ignore this advice, and a shocking 1 in 10 credit card owners have their PIN numbers written down in the same place they keep their actual card.  Is this laziness, forgetfulness or just thoughlessness?  This is difficult to work out, and since there can be no absolutely positive answer on the subject we must assume that it’s a mixture of all three.

The only way to combat it is to continue to campaign against doing it.  It is enormously important to memorise your PIN number and not keep it with your card; it’s easy to pick a number that’s important to you (try a friend’s birthday, not your own).

So to those massive 7 million credit card users, i say memorise your number and stop writing it down!

When you shop online you really do put your money in other peoples hands.  It’s as simple as that really.  When you type in your credit card details they’re out there and there’s nothing you can do about it.  Or is there?  Well you can ensure that the site you are buying from has the little padlock symbol in the corner.  This should tell you that it’s pretty safe, and the company probably have excellent firewalls and stuff like that to protect you and your credit card details from these terrible people.

Also, as with getting your money from a cash machine, you need to preotect your numbers and/or passwords.  These are usually passwords when you shop with your credit card online, and these are the things you need to be careful of.  Now i’m not a computer  whizz or anything like that, but i do know that some people can hack information, and if they can find out your date of birth it’s probably not a good idea to use it as a password is it; in the same way it’s not a good idea to use it as your credit card pin number either.

So protect yourself but using sensible numbers and passwords, go on safe websites, and change your passwords often.

We used to be told not to carry too much cash around didn’t we?  Can you remember your mum telling you?  I can.  Well now we’re told to watch out for our credit cards!  We’ll never be safe.  Just when you thought that your credit card was safe because they needed a pin number, you’re wrong, and believe me there are still plenty of mistakes that can be made with this.

I know it may seem like an obvious thing to say, but i will say it anyway.  When you are carrying around a credit or debit card in your walled, purse, bag, or whatever else you put it in, do not keep your pin number in there too.  You can laugh, but still many people keep their pin right next to their card!  This is for various reasons, and they usually relate to being too lazy to memorise the number, or go to a machine and simply change it.  If you keep your pin in your wallet or purse, you will lose all your money – FACT!

Now, there is also another way they can get you with this.  Even if you haven’t left your pin in your wallet they’ll still have a good go at it.  And let’s face it, they get three tries at the cash machine don’t they.  You can make this very easy for them if you use any numbers that may be in your wallet, like date of birth or house number etc.  They will try these first!  Don’t make it easy.