6 Digit PIN

I haven’t tried - but I’ll put that on my list of things to test!

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Vanquis Online Credit Card account manager used 5 digits too, it really annoys me :joy:

I have a mental triangle with letters in

e.g. (but not actual letters)

A
ON
VAT
BONE
ALIES
MORMON

And each letter corresponds to a number

So whenever I need a 5 or 6 digit pin I remember the word and key in the numbers

So SNAKE would represent 76253
APPLE is 27753

So apart from having a longer pin on cards you could have a virtual pinpad as part of an app for signing in, like

1 2 3
ABC DEF

4 5 6
GHI JKL MNO

7 8 9
PRS TUV WXY

In Australia (at least with the bank I used to work with), cards came with a 4 digit PIN, but if you wanted to change it, you had to choose at least 6. Mine is an 8 digit PIN. I believe there is support for up to 12 digits.

The spec for some parts of the banking system allows up to 12 but other parts and internal system often have restricted field lengths so I would not exceed 6 personally for fear it would increase the number of occassions I was unable to use a card

I have found that most card payment machines only accept the 4 digit PIN - except for the very few which only accept the 6 digit… :slight_smile:

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I am used to a 6 digit pin system overseas, so changed my mondo pin to a 6 digit one as well. I encountered payment rejections and pin lock when I tried to pay at M&S today. I guess I will try the truncated one next time. Thanks for the post.

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We have a few foreigners in our xenophobic little town and they regularly use our local shops. I spoke to one about banking systems and he said his 5 digit pin works OK in all 4 shops.

So I’ve had a six digit pin for a while - occasionally I need to truncate it - but that’s quite rare now

My main problem is with Monzo itself - the app/systems won’t take the truncated pin - and only allow for a 4 digit pin.

So Dear Monzo - can you update your systems to allow longer pins - that way I can send payments via the app and do things like set up ApplePay without having to go to an ATM and shorten my pin to 4 digits.

Thanks!

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They’ve actually stopped you from setting a PIN greater than 4 digits now (the ATM will just say it failed), so I don’t think that’s coming anytime soon.

I believe a member of staff said that they’d have some issues with long PINs crashing certain card terminals.

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It might be good to add this information to the app. I was not aware this was a UK limitation. US banks allow 6 digit PINs.

I tried changing my PIN at a UK ATM, but it kept failing. Upon opening the app I was informed my PIN choice was not secure enough. This lead me to believe I needed to try something else, which I did. After a few attempts I tried another ATM with the same
issue. Eventually I went to a third ATM which only allowed 4 digit PINs.

It would be good if the app could inform the proper reason for declining or allow longer PINs. This would reduce the number of ATM transactions. I am not sure if Monzo pay for PIN services or balance inquiries as they do for withdrawals. The in-app notification only mentions withdrawals, but appears on any ATM transaction.

Even better would be US style online PIN changes in app.

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