I wonder how many remember Access

Monzo Chat
21

i dont think they put them in wallets any more , but i remember them also thinking i was the king of the castle when i was younger lol

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22

if i remember right solo didnt have as many features as switch ? i could be wrong

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23

Solo was the equivalent of Visa Electron I think. Electronic use only and all transactions had to be authorised?

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24

I seem to remember it being a “cut down” version of switch. Sadly, it was (some) years back now but I vaguely remember it had a low spending limit (might have even been a fiver?) but I might be wrong.

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25

yeah it seems so long ago that these cards were about … ok i feel ancient now lol , i seem to rember and could be wrong that it also depended which bank you used as to which version you got im sure RBS was switch and BOS was solo … again i could be wrong

26

What’s funny about it was the bank I was with - we got given an actual chequebook to use along with the card.

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27

Both RBS and BoS (along with Halifax) issued Switch cards. As mentioned above, Solo cards were what you got if the bank didn’t think you were good enough for a Switch card.

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28

The first multifunction card was Visa, when Barclays issued their Connect debit card in 1987. Switch came along in 1988.

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29

im not sure if barclays had much of a presence in scotland at that time , not that i can remember any ways :slight_smile:

switch was certinally the first card i remember :slight_smile:

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30

NatWest Access was my very first credit card, aged 18 :smile:

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31

Or too young for switch…

you could get a solo card from age 11 (I got mine at 12 when the bank came into school) and it worked much the way you’de expect except you had to have funds and I believe it also limited what you could buy (e.g no cigarettes etc)

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32

That was my first credit card too - sometime in the early 80s, I’d guess.

If you banked with Barclays, you got a Barclaycard. The other three banks (NatWest, Lloyds, Midland) gave you an Access card. I was with Lloyds.

Later on, it became Mastercard.

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33

How did they police that? The bank would only know where you’d spent the money, not what you’d actually bought there.

34

From reading up on it, I think the terminal somehow knew it was a solo card so would decline the purchase. I’m no expert though.

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35

Ahh the flexible friend. I remember my dad having one. He was well chuffed at the time

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36

Yes, I think it was enforced at the merchant end by card BIN rather than by the bank itself.

37

and of course there was the joy of the card imprint machine at that time also , i wonder if credit fraud was higher then or now

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38

Now.

The attack vectors are infinite these days.

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39

True, though back in those days if you had the card and could make a reasonable stab at the signature you could keep using the card until it expired, as long as you kept to low value transactions.

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40

Exactly, we partly need to have better security these days because the opportunities for would-be fraudsters are so much larger.

The overall level of fraud always gets maintained even as security is tightened up, because people are always finding loopholes and new ways around security measures. It’s a game of cat and mouse.

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