Credit unions starting the process of deciding when and how toconvert their card portfolios from cards with magnetic stripesalone to cards with smart chips may find a new white paper fromCard Services for Credit Unions a useful guide.

The major card brands have announced they will support the newcards, which are widely used in other countries, on a staggeredschedule which is supposed to culminate in late 2015.

EMV: Backgroundand Implications for Credit Unions, co-authored by CSCUand First Annapolis Consulting, outlines the EMV roadmap includingtimelines and key dates such as the fraud liability shift set forOct. 1, 2015.

The paper also reviews implications for issuers and otherstakeholders and analyzes considerations around various cardissuance strategies.

“Proper planning of the optimal time and method to review cardsis perhaps the most important consideration for credit unions asthey approach their EMV decision-making process,” said Robert Hackney, president of CSCU in Tampa, Fla.

“Credit unions have several options for EMV conversion dependentupon their individual fraud characteristics, membership andproducts, status of EMV enabled terminal deployment as well asfinancial and human resources that can be committed to an EMVimplementation,” Hackney said.

As the paper makes clear, the move to smart chip enabled cardsis challenging for many credit unions because, in part, it requiresthey have a good deal of data about their card programs in order todecide which smart chip implementation strategies makes the mostsense for their credit union and members.

For example, a credit union located on a border or with a lot ofmembers who travel overseas might want to be one of theinstitutions that move more quickly to implement smart chip cardswhich their traveling members may be able to use more easilyoverseas. On the other hand, credit unions which delayimplementing smart chip enabled cards too long run the risk ofraising their fraud risk significantly higher as other cards becomemore difficult to compromise, the paper said.