Just one Pin for 6m Brits

By Sarah Engle, Wed 6 Aug 2008 - Published in Credit Cards

Some six million British debit and credit cardholders have a single four-digit personal identification number (Pin) to avoid the need for remembering more, a new survey has found.

Research by Abbey Banking discovered that while the average Brit uses three financial providers for their monetary matters, six million have one Pin which gives them access to all of their funds.

And although this can be a simpler way to remember the number rather than memorising different codes, Abbey Banking's director Steve Shore said consumers should still take precautions – because if a fraudster gained access to that Pin, they could potentially steal more money from different accounts.

"Those with one password for all their accounts should take care to ensure that this is as secure as possible, using a combination of letters and numbers wherever feasible," he added.

Mr Shore also urged people never to write down Pin numbers and always keep them shielded when being entered into a keypad.

This news could be of great use to debit and credit cardholders, following a recent report from payments association Apacs, which found that in the UK a combined Ł354 billion was spent on plastic cards during 2007.

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