Signatures are Dumb (Use Emojis Instead) 

Keep in mind a key factor was how he approved the other contracts with the same guy. He would text back "yep", "yea" ,etc. previously as a signature to the contract.

July 2020: Buyer's representative discussed the contract with the farmer (by phone), then put it to paper, signed it(!), made a photocopy, and sent to the farmer, asking him to "Please confirm terms of durum contract". To that the farmer replied with "Looks good". The deal went fine. September 2020: the exact same thing, except farmer's reply was "Ok". October 2020: the exact same, except the reply was "yup". March 2021: this case here. All of a sudden, the emoji is supposed to mean nothing. The story isn't that an emoji is all of a sudden BROADLY legally binding or anything, but that in THIS case, involving THESE business partners, based on THEIR past business dealings, the emoji CAN be interpreted as confirmation.

The reason an emoji was legally binding in this case, is because they had a history where the seller would agree with a simple "ok" or the like, without needing a separate contract.

I never sign my cards. The only time I had a cashier check my signature (they gave me a pen to sign it on the spot) was when I was making duty free purchases in Japan, because of course Japanese cashiers would care about minor procedural details like signatures.

The reason tap payments are so trusted is that the credit card companies are not scared you might be pickpocketed and your card stolen, but instead getting skimmed. A tap payment is like google authenticator, it creates a new number mathematicaly, and as such you can't use it to clone a card. But a magstripe is the same each time, meaning a simple skimmer and camera to catch your pin is enough to completely clone your card (minus the tap payments).

In the U.S., we have the Uniform Commercial Code (UCC) - each state adopts their own, but they are generally uniform between states - that says you can use anything as a signature, as long as the signer intends for that ‘anything’ to be their signature. A big ‘X’, an emoji, a drawing of a cat, doesn’t matter - intent is more contractually binding than the form of the signature (or signature analog).

It's _wild_ to me that in the US and Canada, you _need_ to have had a credit card, something it's so easy to accidentally fall into a debt spiral with if you ever forgot to pay it on time, in order to do basically anything in life. I'm in Aus and the first "credit" I ever had was my mortgage. I always use a debit card for that piece of mind. It would stress me out so much if I lived in the US or Canada and _had_ to use a credit card!

Signing for packages is hilarious (at least here in Sweden): they ask you your first name and then hold out a device with a small touchscreen where they want you to "sign" with your finger. There is no way to write anything like my signature on that thing and they hardly ever ask for ID.

The logic behind 'see ID' instead of your signature on the back of the card, is that plenty of people are decent at forging signatures, given a sample. But if all the thief had is your card, with 'see ID' printed in block letters, you could use the obviously wrong signature to win the chargeback dispute. Right or wrong, I first heard it in the class in high school where they teach you to balance a checkbook (in the 80s). Also heard it in the 90s in the army 'financial literacy for new enlisted personnel' class at fort sill. Heard it many times since then, including from my accountant, and 2 different lawyers. I personally believe it's mostly moot in this decade, but I still do it, because why not?

I remember always seeing SEE ID on the back of my parents CCs and debit cards instead of signing the back so cashier's would ask for their ID regardless. I always thought it odd so I noticed in the mid 2000s people just stopped checking IDs unless age was being verified... Even CC purchases.

The contactless payment limit in the UK used to be £40 but because of COVID, it was increased to £100, you can customise the limit on banking apps or credit card management apps

as a European that credit score thing makes absolutely no sense to me. how is constantly being slightly in debt "financially responsible"?

In Brazil how you pay for your credit card is different, you choose the day that your bill closes and then you have 5 to 10 days to pay it before you start to have interest rates(for example, mine closes at the 3rd of every month and I have until the 10th to pay it).

i am an EMT and have had patients sign for the transport with a smiley face, a swear word, etc. if i saw it happen, it counts as a legal signature.

In France, I never had to show my ID for any tapping. We also don't sign cards. But there is some level of consumer protection, so while you may need to have to wait to get another card, you can oppose transactions made without your consent.

People commenting on how it's ridiculous aren't actually familiar with the case itself especially since key details were missed in the video above. The key point in the case is that he had set a precedent in previous interactions with the same buyer without actually ever signing the contract. Replying "Yes, looks good." "Yes" and "Yep" to contracts in the past. It's a bit suspicious that suddenly the informal agreement method only become a problem when the price of flax rose so much.

Same in Australia. (well New South Wales and the ACT at least). You need a good credit rating to even rent a place! So wisely using a credit card is ONE key component. Another is paying your bills on time (there are more). A really annoying thing is trying to access your credit rating - which you have to pay a pretty decent fee for AND can sometimes negatively impact your credit rating! The whole thing is just insane.

It's insane how entering into a contract is judged on a "more likely than not", i.e. more than 50% chance basis. Luckily in my country contracts have requirements of form: oral contracts are not binding to begin with, he would need to send back the contract with a signature added to the signature field, on top of verbally acknowledging that this constitutes him entering into the contract.

This is ridiculous. Can't wait for the read receipt to be legally binding.

Monzo (and many other new-style UK Banks) allows you to turn off "tap" or contactless as we call it in the UK by just flicking a switch on the App. But the UK contactless limit is £100 now, unless you use Google Pay etc, to which there is no limit.

For dealings in the past the farmer had replied to contracts with stuff like “yes” and “yeah” and then delivered the product. So it is 100% reasonable to interpret the emoji in the same way.

I have always used a 3 bump squiggle with two line through it

Working retail at a department store, I *routinely* ring up 600-1000 USD transactions and do absolutely no checking that people are paying with their actual cards. People tap all the time for those.

I paid $3000 for a new mattress, frame and all, including installation. Paid entirely in full. No ID check at all. Not even a text message from my bank checking if everything was okay.

Those 5k tap limits are insane. Where I live, both credit and debit have 50€ tap limit. It used to be 25€ and when they raised it, people were really scared that their money would be gone.

The signature on the back of a credit card is *supposed* to be the holders contractual agreement to repay the charges in good faith. It was never meant to be used as an example for comparison. However; my feeling was always that it provided a thief my signature for easier forgery, so I never signed my cards. Then an emergency came up and I needed to take a cash advance into my checking account. Both my credit union and the card issuer refused to do it without my signing 'the contract' first.

In china, your credit score decides whether you can fly in A plane. In the US your credit score may decide whether you can afford to fly in A plane. FRRRREEEEEDDOOOOOMMMMM!1!11!!!111111!!!!

this confusion even existing is EXACTLY why I will start just stealing stuff before I even TOUCH a credit card.

Pro-Tip: If you live in the US, Never *ever* use a debit card any more than you actually have to. Once you get the ability to use a credit card, use it and pay it off, because not just the credit score stuff, but US-based banks are not *required* to honor refunds should your debit card get stolen and someone cleans you out, unless they have it specifically stated they will in their agreement (they probably won’t), but credit cards are.

When US colleagues visit me here in the UK their unsigned credit cards cause endless problems. Technically, although many cashiers won’t enforce this, you cannot pay with a credit card that is not signed - and if you sign it and come back they also cannot accept it.

I've seen that newer credit cards/bank cards without embossed text on them don't even have a signature field in europe - because chip and signature/swipe and signature have never been a thing in the europe. We haven't used signature since those machine that impresses the embossed text onto a piece of paper. I have also never had to show ID when paying no matter the amount, when using a PIN code or tapping.

Japan has been ahead of this for years. They have been using a stamp with your name on it.

I worked in commercial credit at a larger credit union in Ontario for over 4 years. I worked with the people that actually approved the loans and was able to sit in on their loan meeting everyday. I never heard them say anything bad about a company not using their line of credit. If the company didn't use it for a number of years, we might suggest that they cancel it or we charge a larger fee (see below if you're curious about why), but that's it. Never was it a black mark against the company. Banks (at least in Canada) have to keep money in reserves for a certain percent of all loans, including the full amount of lines of credit even if they are not used because the line of credit could be used in full at any time.. The bank has to pay interest to whoever they borrowed that reserve money from, so there is a cost there. Normally, that cost is covered by interest paid on the loan, but if the line of credit isn't being used, then a larger fee can be charged to cover it. There were also times where we didn't worry about a larger fee because we were making enough money off of the other loans or deposits.

I'm in the US and I can confirm that when they were talking about tap limits it was the first time I'd heard of it

this is absolutely ridiculous, and a horrible precedent to set

I used to sign receipts with little sonic the hedgehog drawings to see if the signature even mattered or the bank would say anything. Never mattered so I didn’t keep up with it.

Here in Australia we have a $100 limit on the tap to pay, anything over the $100 you can tap but you need to enter your pin to be approved.

APR = **Annual** Percentage Rate, just like how APY is **Annual** Percentage Yield. So compounding monthly means you always gotta divide the percentage rate by 12 :) Still not good to carry a balance anyways. Bad for your credit score, and while it's nowhere near as bad as having your balance increase by 20% monthly, ~2% is still quite a lot and adds up quickly!

I can't imagine that things are much different in Canada compared to the States, but the point of the signature on a card isn't for identification, it's acceptance of the contract between you and the credit card company. It's generally against the payment processing agreements the CCs have with retailers to reject someone from using a card as long as it's signed (or to require ID checks, signature matching, etc... before accepting it). A signature is literally agreeing that the CC company will cover unauthorised use of the card, which makes it all the funnier when people treat it like a security check against that.

LTT is the only yt channel I could trust to take advice on credit . Id says 50% of your audience is completely in the dark on where to even start on credit.

the tap limit in belgium is as standard 50 bucks with no pin, but you have to put a pin above 50. im sure you can change it tho

If you pay before the payment date you are giving the company extra money. They get the interest on the money you paid.

What if he had used a different emoji that was more ambiguous, like a haha 😂 or a heart ❤? It’s weird where this could go as far as courts interpreting emojis

Here on Brazil the tap to pay turned common around 2020 and it’s normal to pay any value using it, but some banks ask for the pin depending if the hour and the value are suspect. Before we all just used the chip on it with the pin.

I've been drawing random things in the rare situations where I need to sign anything for over a decade now lol at least here it's just a acknowledgement of the thing you signing, the contents or style don't matter.

In India, max tap-to-pay limit is around Rs. 5000, i.e. around $60. And for online transactions on domestic websites, you must enter card details along with an OTP that's sent to your registered mobile number. Now that's what we call as security.

Signatures are actually quite useful in banking documentation. I investigate money laundering in banks, and comparing passport copies to signatures on corporate documents often reveals issues in the documentation of banks. This isn't something the directors of the companies are forging, but rather it reveals that the bank has no idea who the directors and authorised signatories of their corporate client is, which shows a lack of KYC documentation. Signatures are easy to forge, however that isn't the main advantage of Signatures, rather they are useful for knowing who signed something without malice, and also in contract cases Signatures are useful because at the time of signing people usually don't expect to be fighting this contract later. If the contract isn't signed but was sent back with changes, it can show that the person was rather negotiating and not expecting this contract to yet be binding, for example. Signatures are a useful part of overall behaviour to extrapolate some of the circumstances, rather than being a useful ID mechanism. They are a useful ID mechanism to show something as dispositive in some cases, however a fraudulent person could use the wrong signature on purpose for example as most contracts don't also include "and send me your ID to compare". It's not really a big problem in my experience, but useful for knowing who signed particular documents throughout the history of a company, and was monumental in one investigation to show that the settlor of a trust was in fact acting as the trustee directly and the official trustee was only a trustee in name, and as such the settlor was considered a beneficial owner which changed a lot about the case.

I don’t get pins either, I’ve bought lunch for 15 dollars and it requires my pin, but if I buy a 700 dollar GPU? Nah you’re good, no ID or anything required

In France the tap limit is 50€ and in Germany it's 30€. And you have to enter your pin after 5 contactless transactions. I have to validate online payment with my phone. Why are there no security measures at all in the USA?

"If you don't (have a credit rating), you can't buy a house" Manual underwriting. A credit score is _not_ necessary in North America. There are a few times that will be inconvenient, but having a zero/indeterminable credit score is not a bad thing.

7:55 So for phones and smartwatches, the ability to unlock the device is the second factor. I basically pay for everything at any amount with my Apple Watch, and TBH it's probably safer than a card you have to _hand over_ to somebody else. The watch is the "thing that I have", and the passcode is the "thing that I know". With a smartphone, the phone is the "thing that I have" and the fingerprint/face ID is the "thing that I am".

The only time I have had to sign for a transaction is when the merchants network was down and payments couldn't process straight away. I know I'm that in some places like NZ tap to pay (paywave) will ask for a pin over a certain amount.

Lol Credit rating. I was carrying 11k in debt and making less than 8. I was repairing to make ends buy parts on CC and get paid by customer, go pay my minimums. By the time I got a decent job I could start paying off the debt. But I had excellent credit history 🙃, still couldn't get a house because my wife had never had any credit card or debt in her life and thus no credit score needed to build credit. We wound up getting her a Kohl's card which we used as cash and a 'loan' from a credit union (super weird, we gave them 1,000, then used it as collateral on 'borrowing' 1,000)

In a legal standpoint, the seller really has the rights to claim his money. BUT, a company/individual who's selling something, in their right mind should not replicate this, this is really a very irresponsible way of handling a sales contract. You'll just give yourself a headache. 😵‍💫

I denied someone based on their credit card not being signed. Once. It was clearly a teenager and clearly a woman's name and this was a dude. I'm not going to risk my job by approving that if it seems shady. He later came back with his mom, the owner of the card, who was in the car and she made the purchase. I worked at Best Buy in computers and he was trying to buy a two thousand dollar Mac. Yeah, no, get your lazy parent to go inside with you.

There used to be no tap limit in the UK, then there was a string of thefts and it got dropped down to £20, and over time it's been progressively increased.

Not sure about Canada, but in the states your signature supposed to be on both your ID and bank cards. Hence you're supposed to ask for id to verify the signatures are similar enough. Digital signatures are generally pretty stupid in comparison.

Why was he so opposed on explaining the debit card stuff. "The Europeans" obviously didn't understand the American debit card, so why not make that side note? You can't buy a house without it? What?!

Without getting into how financial systems work in different countries there is one thing we should be able to agree on: they are usually set up in stupid ways designed to make the banks more money.

So, basically you have to spend a lot to get a better credit score, or how does this work exactly? I'm a European, I pay almost everything with a debit card, and to be able to get a house, the bank mainly needs to know what my income is, how much I can pay upfront and if I have any outstanding debts.

A credit score isnt a score of how likely you are to pay your bills. A credit score is how likely the bank is to make money on you. Thats why carrying ~30% balance on credit cards is good, and having a LOC and not using it is bad.

How unbelievably stupid. When something dumb like this happens, you wonder if the judge is being stupid or if the lawmakers are being stupid. Either way, it makes you scratch your head and wonder how ostensibly very intelligent people with law degrees end up making incredibly dumb decisions like this...

Why do we carry a plastic piece around to make a payment? Because a phone can die for any reason, be low on battery, whatever and then you can at least buy your bus ticket back home.

If they had verbal agreement before and then i responded with a thumbs up "👍" without any follow up, thenit could be argued that i was agreeing to it.

At my company we sometimes ask subcontractors to respond (in slack) in any way, with words or emoji to verify receipt of information, and sometimes when explicitly said,also to verify agreement with any said information. 👍🏾,😁,💯 all indicating agreement with the information or even pay for a project. Actual words of discent in case of disagreement. In those cases though I've very specifically stated "please provide any positive response in agreement of..." or any questions/other statements if there are concerns. Everyone generally throws their favorite positive emotions on it, or asks for further explanation or changes, usually ending in an actual statement of agreement. Don't know if any of this is legally binding but everyone's intents are fairly clear 95% of the time. All this is why this was a very interesting case for me to explore.

Australia has a tap limit of aud$100 that was only temporarily increased to $200 for covid

There's actually a Gen Z congressman who had to sleep in his office cause he didn't have the credit to rent an apartment.

5:59 when I worked at a walgreens I to was a stickler about seeing ur ID when buying nicotine or alcohol. We have a freaking sign that says we card EVERYONE and yet people still blew smoke up my ass about needing to show ID it was so annoying. I had an old dude say "you see thst flag on my credit card means I served that's all the ID I need" I told him " Sir do u see this sign in ur line of sight right before u walked to this register it says we ID everyone for alcohol and nicotine no where on there does it say military service (which a design on a credit card does not prove) makes you exempt"

Credit ratings tell lenders how good of a decision it is to lend you money, not how reliable you are at paying it back. If you never take any loans (e.g. put stuff on a credit card, have an unused line of credit) or pay back loans early, the lender doesn't make as much money and your credit rating goes down to reflect that. It's super predatory; however, it makes sense from the lender's points of view.

It used to be the case that cashiers would do *some* verification that you are the owner of the card. That is no longer the case. Most cashiers no longer take your card; the machine sits on your side of the checkout and you are expected to operate it. This means the business is no longer responsible for stolen cards. The speed is nice, but it worries me about the security. Checking ID or signature isn't a fool proof, but it's better than not checking at all. Small stores dont always take credit cards either. In my opinion, contactless payment is a failure and should be shut down. The idea was to speed up transactions. Except now they require you to answer 15 questions when you use them (phone number for our membership, do you want to donate, was the store clean, etc) that they dont save time. They're just a security risk and another vector for ads.

Honestly, I only ever use my physical card for Chip - I've disabled my contactless function on my physical card completely. The only time I use my physical card is when the shop doesn't;t accept contactless at all, so it was just a security hole I wasn't actually using its benefits from

I’ve had a client of mine, who I knew very well at that point, tap with his card for a 12,000~ dollar sale. While it’s something I wouldn’t trust for 99% of situations it’s totally a thing.

From a farmer friend: Based on the year this was from, he likely failed to deliver the product as he was able to sell it for more outside of the contract, even after paying any fees for failure to deliver. Due to prices rising so much after the contract was negotiated.

I had an emergency credit card for car repairs, the first time i used it, it went through and then the creditor closed the account so i couldnt use it i lost a chunk of my available credit and all i could do wa oay it off, so my credit score took a dive and the another card was closed as soon as i paid it off and again lost a a chunk of my available credit and lost some more cedit score

In the U.S. merchants are not supposed to ask for ID based on their contract with the credit card companies (at least that used to be true). We also still don't have PINs 🙄

2023 and people are learning why we are not using ideograms to communicate. Languages and grammar rules evolved for the reason and that reason was precision and clarity of communication.

In the u.s. most of the time you still need a pin if you tap a debit card. But you don't need a pin for a credit card so you can just tap.

Tap to pay here in the uk is £100 max (currently $130)

It could be that financial institutes using machine learning algorithms to detect fraud use $5,000 as the "elbow" point for optimum performance.

the best thing i bough in my entire life was buying a custom made stamp with my signature on it.

Paying in Poland seems reasonable compared to the video. Above certain point you have to use PIN and online transactions require either confirming via popup window with bank site or on mobile with usage of biometrics or application PIN.

emojis are legally binding? we are now no longer going to have english; we will only emojispeak

If i show a contract to someone and say "did you see this" and they yes, they aren't legally bound to the terms of the contract, that's the whole point of signing a contract lol

Prices should be fully negotiable until one or both parties have put forth a significant effort toward the transaction (ie... Driving to meet them or holding the device or product.) At a reasonably assumed amount, or the transaction has occured. As long as the product is as listed or described.

Oral agreement are legally binding but hard to proove. This emoji was the equivalent of an oral agreement in a digital discussion.

Man I love living in a country where verbal agreements aren't usually legally binding

My debit card has a limit set by my bank of 50 bucks, anything above that and it needs pin validation, even when I use Apple Pay that feature kicks in where it asks for my phone password to use it in the first place and THEN asks for my pin at the register. This has happened at my local supermarket several times to date, I am very unsure why more banks haven't adopted this feature.

I was told they passed a law now you’re not allowed to overpay your credit card more than like $5 Unless you do a balance transfer, that’s the only way I’ve seen it still working

In Hong Kong. We have no tap limit that I’m aware of. Just the credit limit on your card.

PSA: Having a personal line of credit with zero balance doesn't hurt your credit score. The reason it's bad for a business line of credit is because 1) those usually have big annual fees so if you aren't going to use it then why do you have it, and 2) they are usually granted with the understanding that they're funding business operations, so if you aren't using it, then that looks weird.

had to use my debit card as proof of identification when getting my license. They didn't accept it because i didn't have my signature on the back so they returned it to me with a pen to sign it in front of them

In america pins arent required for credit cards still... only Debit. And half the time you can charge it as a credit card to skip the pin.

On this episode of Linus and Luke discuss topics they have no expertise or required background knowledge to judge

Did Luke just say: "PINs aren't really that secure"? Because 10,000 possible combinations and the card being locked after 3 wrong attempts seems pretty hard to get around In Europe they've been standard for 20+ years and have never been seen as unsafe. The CVC code on the other hand, that's unsafe. Just steal someone's card and you can buy whatever you want online. Luckily, most cards in Europe require 2FA for online purchases Edit: in the Netherlands, the tap feature is pretty safe as well, because you can set your own limit (usually €25 or €50), and your PIN is required every couple of transactions. Usually between 5 and 10, but I think it's a bit random. So sometime it'll ask my PIN two times in a row even though I'm under the tap limit

Like most conflicts, it's a failure of communication

If I remember correctly, my bank gives the option to set a value limit for confirmation-less tapping

I'm always going on about how stupid the American legal system is and then Canada makes me go "actually its not THAT bad.".

As someone from the US, I wish we would abolish credit score. It's a system to punish poor people and make sure they can never stop being poor while making sure rich people can buy everything they want. Credit cards being good because they give you a good credit is part of the problem.

I've tapped to pay (no pin, just NFC) in a foreign country with US$2300 for an apartment's lease.

Actually I would not paint a picture that all us financial institutions have no tap limit. I think some banks do have tablets that you can now adjust through the online banking portal