On 11/9/2011 7:06 AM, notbob wrote:

I moved from CA to CO. The banks, here, claim no such practice has
ever existed anywhere. This I found hilarious, as the bank I was
trying to open an account at here in CO has also has branches in CA
that do exactly that. Whether or not CA still has usable-everywhere
ATM cards, I do not know, having moved 3 yrs ago.

You can still get an "ATM-only" card in California that does not have
the Visa or MC logo. That's what I always request (it's not the
default). These are usable for PIN based transactions at many merchants,
but it's not like the non-PIN based Visa/MC debit cards which you can
use at most places that take credit cards (with a few exceptions).

Banks used to have reward programs for PIN based transactions since they
charged the merchant a hefty fee and there was no payment to Visa or
Mastercard but now that those merchant fees are limited by law most
banks have dropped the rewards program.

These cards were never "usable-everywhere" they were limited to
merchants that were set up to accept ATM cards, mostly places like
supermarkets and drug stores.