How do Debit/Credit cards know how much money they should have? Especially before the Internet.

Question

When I slidey debit card, how does the card reader know if there is money on it?

I understand nowadays that the card reader probably just asks over the Internet how much money the account has, but debit cards are older than the Internet, so what did they do back then?

In: Technology

Answer 1

Debit cards and credit cards are relatively new. It was far more common to pay via check. In fact, debit cards until recently were called check cards by many banks.