<P> Many smaller merchants in France refuse to accept debit cards for transactions under a certain amount because of the minimum fee charged by merchants' banks per transaction (this minimum amount varies from € 5 to € 15.25, or in some rare cases even more). But more and more merchants accept debit cards for small amounts, due to the massive daily use of debit card nowadays . Merchants in France do not differentiate between debit and credit cards, and so both have equal acceptance . It is legal in France to set a minimum amount to transactions, but the merchants must display it clearly . </P> <P> In January 2016, 57.2% of all the debits cards in France also had a contactless payment chip . The maximum amount per transaction is set to € 20 and the maximum amount of all contactless payments per day is between 50 and € 100 depending on the bank . </P> <P> According to French law, banks are liable for any transaction made with a copy of the original card and for any transaction made without a card (on the phone or on the Internet), so banks have to pay back any fraudulent transaction to the card holder if the previous criteria are met . Fighting card fraud is therefore more interesting for banks . As a consequence, French banks websites usually propose an "e-card" service ("electronic (bank) card"), where a new virtual card is created and linked to a physical card . Such virtual card can be used only once and for the maximum amount given by the card holder . If the virtual card number is intercepted or used to try to get a higher amount than expected, the transaction is blocked . </P> <P> Debit cards have enjoyed wide acceptance in Germany for years . Facilities already existed before EFTPOS became popular with the Eurocheque card, an authorization system initially developed for paper checks where, in addition to signing the actual check, customers also needed to show the card alongside the check as a security measure . Those cards could also be used at ATMs and for card - based electronic funds transfer (called Girocard) with PIN entry . These are now the only functions of such cards: the Eurocheque system (along with the brand) was abandoned in 2002 during the transition from the Deutsche Mark to the euro . As of 2005, most stores and petrol outlets have EFTPOS facilities . Processing fees are paid by the businesses, which leads to some business owners refusing debit card payments for sales totalling less than a certain amount, usually 5 or 10 euro . </P>

When were debit cards introduced in the us