We were visiting Girona yesterday and decided to purchase one of those little car navigation gadgets that have become so popular nowadays. Whilst travelling around we have noticed before that such items are usually less expensive in Spain than say France or Italy. So a trip to Spain usually means a buying expedition as well.

Anyway, we always go to Media Markt in Girona for electrical items and are well familiar with the process involved in paying by credit card there; you have to produce photo ID along with your credit card. As we don’t have a Spanish ID card, being British and Australian of course, we have always produced a photo UK drivers license as ID when there and this has always been accepted. Until yesterday. After standing in a very long queue for about 45 minutes we got to the cash point and the cashier refused to accept our drivers license as ID.  So if you are not Spanish and choose not to haul your passport around everywhere with you what else can you produce?.

This is a security measure because until recently there was no ‘chip and pin’ with credit/debit card transactions in Spain; they checked your signature on your ID against your card. But now the chip and pin is becoming standard so there is no reason to request a person’s ID, but the Spanish are still sticking to the old process. The shops there still ask you to sign the credit card receipt even though the slip says ‘ no signature required’! This is contrary to what the banks advise as signing then reduces the security that chip and pin offers. But they still persist.

After approaching the management about the problem it was finally solved; there was another British lady there who was experiencing the same difficulty, she only had a UK drivers license for ID as well.

My advice to any Brit’s, or Australians or non-Spanish in general is this; if you wish to use a debit/credit card in Spain in the future have your passport on you at all times otherwise your transaction will be refused. I hope eventually that the Spanish move with the times and change their practices as regards chip and pin transactions otherwise they will have a lot of hassles on their hands with tourists.