No chip-and-PIN hassles

This item appears on page 16 of the August 2010 issue.

The May edition of ITN had five pages of letters from subscribers’ telling the difficulties they had using magnetic-stripe debit and credit cards from the United States in Europe.

My husband and I have been traveling the world for 40 years, and we were leaving on May 1 for London, Paris and Brugge. These reports caused us a great deal of anxiety and we almost canceled our trip.

Never in our two weeks abroad — in hotels, small places of business, metro stations, smaller towns, restaurants, bars, theaters, etc. — did we run into any difficulty using either credit cards or ATM cards.

PHYLLIS AXEL

Chicago, IL