SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News) – One business owner works seven days a week to keep his gas station running, but the financial sacrifices he’s had to make, have been hard.
Right now the Valero located on Erie Boulevard in Syracuse is successful. Sam Mann, the owner, said he’s making money, but the little things along the way are starting to add up.
Now, Mann is being pressured to spend a large amount of his income because at the start of October, credit card companies like Visa and MasterCard are expecting all gas stations to have chip readers at their pumps.
This is because the chip contains a key component that authenticates the card and generates a one-time code with each transaction.
The pumps at Mann’s Valero don’t have chip readers right now. Instead they have a system that encourages customers to swipe their cards. These aren’t the safest systems when it comes to financial safety, though.
According to Fuel Retailer Connexxus, the group expects the fuel industry to experience cover $450 million of card fraud in 2020 alone.
Edwin Fuller, Valero’s cashier, knows this, but he still doesn’t seem phased.
“I don’t think [the switch] would matter,” Fuller said. “If students come in here from out of state or out of town and they don’t know how to do their card outside, it forces them to come inside and use it on our regular card system.”
Mann has already switched to using chip readers at his register, but he said one chip reader cost him $15,000. That chip reader stopped working recently, so he had to buy another.
“After a while I gotta keep buying. To me, it’s going to hurt me more in the pocket. That’s the bottom line,” Mann said. “It already cost me $15,000, and now we’re talking about at least $25,000 to $30,000 more.”
But Mann said he feels he has no choice.
“So money wise it’s going to cost me money, but I have to go with whatever the law is,” Mann said.
