On the backs of some of my money plastic - debit cards and ATM cards in particular, I have several symbols:
Interlink, Plus and Star. (No Cirrus on any of mine.)

Last September, my credit union-issued debit card failed in Switzerland and at one or two banks in Scotland.

I noticed yesterday that it does NOT carry the Interlink logo on the back whereas my Bank of America cards do.

Could the fact that the credit union does not belong to Interlink explain the failure of its debit card??

I never have received a real answer to the question I put to the credit union officals: Why did your card fail in Switzerland? All I got was and advanced form of "We ain't got a clue."

Hi BB,

Not all banks are connected to all networks.

Ditto for ATM cards.

That's why I have 3.

You can link your Amex card to your bank account and use it as an ATM card. $5/transaction though.

PS,

Interlink is mostly USA

I looked on the Visa website... I interpret the 'sales talk' to say that Interlink 'bundles' various transaction services, one of which is ATM network but it uses Visa/PLUS for the ATM product.

So, I'd have to say if you have "PLUS" on the card, that alone is supposed to allow access to the ATM 'worldwide'.

A side note: some C/U block use of debit cards in certain countries rife with card fraud, Italy being one our C/U blocked. But I don't recall Switzerland being one of those.

one of my ATM cards is like that and will not work at Clydesdale ATMs in Scotland and one bank (which I can't think of the name right now) in England. But it works at every other UK bank I can think of.

It took me trial and error and a couple of trips to figure that out. But it works just fine at most machines.

Each bank decides which networks to subscribe to. Each network charges the bank a fee, some banks choose to belong to many, others only a couple. The card the bank issues will say which network(s) they subscribe to. Each ATM also has a series of logos stating which networks they accept. If your card and the ATM both display the same logo, you should be good.

Of course there are always the times the network is down. You may have reached your daily limit earlier (because your card resets at midnight local at home, not local in Europe). Your cards magnetic strip may have been too close to a magnet (watch those counters in retail stores, they use a magnet to remove the plastic security tag). Or the ATM is just acting up.

Sometimes it's hard to know which one is the reason your card isn't working.

I usually just go to an ATM that belongs to a different bank and try again.

I still don't think I have a full answer. Perhaps a little more detail is needed.

The Master Card debit card that failed in Switzerland did so at every bank I tried in Interlaken, including Credit Suisse, Berner Kantonal Bank, UBS AG, Esparnesskasse, and Raiffeisen Bank.

The debit card has the Plus and Star logos on it, but not Interlink.

If Interlink is mainly a US netowrk for the vast majority of cases, then the absence of Interlink does not fully explain the failure.

I don't think the fraud aspect would account for it either. I would not think that Switzerland would be rife with fraud; in fact, I would expect just the opposite. Moreover, the card worked in Germany and Scotland.

Besides, my Bank of American ATM and my wife's debit card worked fine.

The guys at the credit union were clueless as I said when I asked them how come their debit card failed in Switzerland. They were the ones I asked first, right after I got home.

Had I not tried it at 5 different banks in Interlaken, I would have decided it was the luck of the draw.
But after I went bank hopping in Interlaken, I don't think that answers the question either.