I know that for really big amounts they called the credit card company. But did they also do it for small amounts of $10-$20? And if so how did it work in a Taxi when there were no mobile phones?
In: 1
Early 80’s working at a high end (linen, candles, china) restaurant we had a printed booklet to check cards if the bill was over $100. We manually swiped the cards on a three copy carbon voucher that customer would sign.
Then came these telephone modem like devices that we would use by punching dollar amount and swiping the mag strip. Machine called a number and you could hear an exchange then it would display an approval number or declined. When the machine was not working the host would call a bank number to get approval code.
Once in a blue moon it would say call hotline. Sometimes they wanted to talk to the cardholder before giving us an approval, other times they would want us to confiscate the card or cut it. We would get $50 if we did either.
Latest Answers