It’s Been Ink-rypted

An older customer is completing a transaction. The digital capture pad prompts for a signature at the payment stage.

Me: “Ma’am, please use the stylus to sign on that screen there.”

Customer: “No! Give me a paper receipt! I’ll sign that.”

I oblige and print out a paper receipt for her.

Customer: “Good! Those systems—” *Points to the screen.* “—are never COMPLETELY secure.”

Me: “Well, no system is COMPLETELY secure, but the electronic receipt is more secure than a physical one.”

Customer: “I don’t trust machines!”

Me: “That’s fine, ma’am.”

Customer: “You sound like you’re disagreeing with the customer.”

Me: “It’s just, if you sign this electronically, your signature will be encrypted into a form where anyone who intercepts it can’t read it, it will be transmitted nearly instantaneously to our corporate headquarters, and it will be archived in an offline database where only a handful of highly paid professionals will have access to it. Orrrrr… you can sign a sheet of paper, and I’ll put that paper in this drawer, and then it’s accessible to anyone who pulls really hard on this drawer.”

Customer: “I still don’t trust machines!”

She chose drawer. She understood drawer.