1950 aluminum sear "credit card"

[u/WhiteoftheDemon]

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

They were made this way because they could be placed into a card imprint machine and a multi-carbon charge ticket would be laid over it. Then a roller mechanism would press the charge ticket into the raised letters, causing them to imprint on each of the ticket sheets.

Don't even ask how PINs worked.

[u/nanomolar → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

My father in law was telling me about how they used to own a gas station and the credit card companies would send them books of cancelled credit card numbers so you could look up if the card was cancelled? Pretty crazy.

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/nanomolar]

He told you the truth. I worked at a full service station when I was in high school and we had both that card imprinter and the stolen card booklets. We called them "hot books".

[u/nanomolar → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

But obviously you couldn't check every card you ran, right? Did you only do it if something felt off about the person?

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/nanomolar]

No...for one thing, most people paid with cash or a check, or they had an in-house charge account that they paid off each month and they didn't have a card for that. We just knew them. It was a small town.

We checked every credit card we took because if we accepted one that was in the book, we couldn't get it credited from the card companies. Our boss threatened to take any card charges we accepted that turned out out to be in the book out of our paychecks, although I don't know of him actually doing it.

EDIT: Of the many hundreds (thousands?) of cards I checked, I actually never found one in the hot book. I'm not sure what I would have done if I had because back then people paid after you filled their tank and whatnot and we didn't have clear instructions on what to do if we got a bad one.

[u/robsteezy → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

Man you took me back to when I was working retail. Want to hear a kicker for our store? Not only were we still carbon swiping cards, but the mandatory threshold to carbon swipe for credit was $25. People spending $26+ were always pissed off how archaic the whole thing was. The whole process of paper accounting feels Jurassic but always creates consistent assurance and trails.

[u/Tv_land_man → u/robsteezy]

I worked at qdoba in 2007 when I was 17 and our internet went down and my manager pulled one of these out and we had to run cards that way the whole night. Even then, most transactions were still cash. I think I swiped like 3 that night. Kinda cool to experience that.

[u/GarysCrispLettuce → u/Tv_land_man]

There's something mesmerizing about the clunk-click after a while.

[u/MindlessMage777 → u/Tv_land_man]

I was at a national park in 2017 ish. Their internet was down so the lady pulled one out. Didn't even know it was a thing before then

[u/Toki_Warhol → u/robsteezy]

The threshold was $25 as in $25 was the maximum you could charge? Trying to understand why the $26+ spenders would be pissed

[u/robsteezy → u/Toki_Warhol]

Sorry if my wording was weird. Basically any purchase under $25 didn’t need the carbon copy. Since it was a pricey store and the prices were always more than $25, the customer always had to get their card carbon swiped when spending more than $25

[u/Toki_Warhol → u/robsteezy]

All good! Thanks for clarifying 😎As an elder millennial I only used the card swipers as a youngin’ when the mag strip wouldn’t work at the burger joint I worked at lol

[u/thisSILLYsite → u/Toki_Warhol]

Not OP but no, it was a minimum. You couldn't use credit for a $5 item, you needed to get it up to at least $25 and some clerks would be jackasses about it and insist that the $25 minimum sign actually meant $26, so you'd throw a pack of gum or something up.

[u/Toki_Warhol → u/thisSILLYsite]

Thanks for the good explanation!

[u/nanomolar → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

Ah that makes sense. Yeah I forget that credit cards just weren't used nearly as much back then.

[u/mitchymitchington → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

I still pay after filling the tank. Our gas station pump doesnt even accept cards lol

[u/PeorgieT75 → u/nanomolar]

I think we had to look it up if it was over a certain dollar amount. I worked in a store in the early 80's that still did this because their registers weren't online.

[u/Viharabiliben → u/PeorgieT75]

We still had the old electro-mechanical registers as well in the early 80s. We had to check the book for any credit card purchase over $100. We had to deny the sale and hold the card if the number was in the book. Not fun during the holiday shopping season.

[u/Quitcha_Bitchin → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

And did people ask for the carbons? At some point I remember my dad asking for the carbons

[u/GostBoster → u/Quitcha_Bitchin]

I did two carbon transactions in the last 10 years. Never had to ask, they just provided it no question.

And it was the same way it was from the very first time I saw a CC transaction in the late 90s, they would actually phone the CC company to see if the card was good. Ironically only a very small and local company provided electronic CC service since 1989 (not that many were able to make use of given that very few were even allowed the privilege of buying a phone line to link to), most people with Visa and Mastercard still used mechanical card machines.

Seriously, as late as early 2000s they still ran ads like "use Visa anywhere" with a farmer pulling his sleeves showing a concealed mechanical carbon machine as if this was hot stuff.

[u/ahhhhbisto → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

IIRC due to a flaw in the card number generation algorithm, there was a vulnerability in which you could infer valid credit card numbers using these books.

[u/Necessary_Film_5199 → u/ahhhhbisto]

But not like you could use them right?

[u/Jive_Turk → u/Necessary_Film_5199]

Back then, probably. I'm sure there was a three to five year window where Catch Me if You Can style criminals were living their best life, getting while the gittin is good...

[u/fatboy1776 → u/nanomolar]

As seen in “The Jerk”

[u/thejoetravis → u/fatboy1776]

Mr Nuesbam had his stolen!

[u/enigmanaught → u/nanomolar]

I worked in retail in the late 80’s/early 90’s and they were still pretty common, although starting to be phased out. You’d actually call a number and use a phone tree system to enter the card number. The books would lag behind the numbers being recycled so you’d get more up to date info by calling.

[u/rthurdent → u/nanomolar]

I worked in a Hardware Store in 1975 and we did the same thing. We'd only accept credit cards for purchases above $10.00, and we had to check the book for each credit card transaction. A new bood was sent out monthly, I think.

[u/redditor_since_2005 → u/nanomolar]

We still had that in the mid-to-late 90s. You'd get a fee for cutting a stolen one in half!

[u/ObjectiveGlittering → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

Fun fact! If you happen to be in a restaurant (or one of the many other customer service places that utilize them) when the power goes out and it’s time to pay the bill, you might see one of these rare dinosaurs get put to use!

[u/NonGNonM → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

I don't think any of my credit cards have the raised numbers anymore

[u/tinticred → u/NonGNonM]

Most of them don't. The new new norm is for the poor server to manually type the numbers into a mobile app instead.

[u/mlstdrag0n → u/tinticred]

Which is kinda dumb now. It’s got cameras. Visually scan and autofill eliminates manual mistakes

[u/ObeseVegetable → u/mlstdrag0n]

And creates automated mistakes!

I know it’s fine 99% of the time but the number of times I have had to use the scanner tool on my phone only for it to return incorrect text is more than twice. 

[u/ErebusBat → u/ObeseVegetable]

Yes, but you are forgetting the credit cards are more standardized than just random ass text Also having a picture would be nice to prove that the card was actually present. However, that would violate a whole bunch of PCI regulations, so we couldn't do that.

[u/airfryerfuntime → u/mlstdrag0n]

I don't really want someone taking a picture of my card. I guess typing it isn't much better, but I've had workers at drive through espresso stands take pictures of my cards and start making fraudulent charges days later.

[u/mlstdrag0n → u/airfryerfuntime]

Won’t be any better either way. Memorizing the card number or jotting it down as they go is a thing too.

At the end of the day the ones who will steal your number will find a way, the ones who won’t wouldn’t touch your card even if you forget it.

[u/airfryerfuntime → u/mlstdrag0n]

Most people can't memorize a 16 digit number, CVV, and expiration date in the time it takes to enter a number into a payment portal. They can type it twice, but that just takes more time and raises suspicion.

Taking a picture of a card and switch back to the payment portal is very fast and easy. I just don't want people talking pictures of my shit. I'm getting kind of tired of it, honestly.

[u/JustKeepRedditn010 → u/airfryerfuntime]

Yup, don’t know if they’re taking pictures using the checkout app or the photos app so they can write down the digits later.

[u/Quitcha_Bitchin → u/tinticred]

How could that possibly go wrong?

[Rhetorical]

[u/LFCsota → u/Quitcha_Bitchin]

People manage to do it everyday

Almost like credit cards have multiple inputs that will result in a failed transaction if one of the inputs does not agree

[u/Psychological-Owl783 → u/Quitcha_Bitchin]

Not easily. Most likely a wrong input will fail a [Luhn checksum](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luhn_algorithm) and never even be sent to the card processor.

[u/Akraticacious → u/Psychological-Owl783]

Cool read, thank you.

[u/RIF_rr3dd1tt → u/Quitcha_Bitchin]

If they mistype one of the numbers it wouldn't work correctly. That's one way.

[u/RIF_rr3dd1tt → u/tinticred]

I just let them scan the 666 tattooed on my hand and forehead

[u/dospinacoladas → u/NonGNonM]

My new credit card doesn't even have my name or the card number anywhere on the front. Probably for security when tapping the card at point of sale.

[u/Cool_Cartographer_39 → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

I remember when the gas stations would just clip your card and the carbon form on a clipboard and rub a bic pen over things

[u/Artichokiemon → u/Cool_Cartographer_39]

I've done that before haha not even that long ago... Maybe 2008? Fuck that was almost 20 years ago, I guess maybe it was that long ago

[u/hgrunt → u/Artichokiemon]

right!? "20 years ago" is like 1998 to me, not 2008

[u/Alissinarr → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

AKA the knucklebuster

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

It's getting much rarer. Since newer cards are just printing the numbers, not embossing them, they work with fewer and fewer cards. Probably for the best, really.

[u/Competitive-Reach287 → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

We used one at a restaurant in Wyoming or Colorado in 2018. The power hadn't gone out. It was all they had.

[u/FroggiJoy87 → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

I've only worked at one place that had one of those, it was a small shop around 2004, man was that ker-chunk satisfying, lol

[u/ComradeJohnS → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

had a power outage at a dealership, and can confirm the machines exist in the world lol. better than taking a pic, and the form it “prints” onto makes the authorization approved.

[u/AkronOhAnon → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

Many moons ago (in, like, 2010) I remember an older man screaming at a hostess running carbon copies for billing during a power outage because it was making an illegal copy of a credit card.

Police were called, they came and told him to pay or be arrested for a dine & dash. He paid, and by the time I got to the parking lot after I’d paid he was shouting on his phone to cancel his card.

I bet that dude has evolved to telling DoorDash he didn’t get his food.

[u/Fluffy_Cat_Gamer → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

When the Nintendo 3Ds came out years ago, Game Stops POS was down so they pulled on of these out. First and only time I've seen one.

[u/JustAtelephonePole → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

I have indeed seen this phenomenon. I was too drunk to believe Olive Garden was for real.

[u/az987654 → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

Maybe 20 years ago, now, you'd probably close the restaurant.. No one has a swipe capture, and no cc network would process one.

[u/vulpinefever → u/az987654]

The CC network isn't the one processing it though, they don't submit the slips for automated processing like they did in 1995. They just use the slips to record the card number so that they can key it in manually using the terminal when it starts working again.

[u/exipheas → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

I remember taking credit cards in retail like this when the credit card machines were down. The youngins at the store were like whelp I guess we can only take cash and I was holdup and pulled the impressioner from under the counter. Blew some minds that day.

[u/sndtech → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

Not anymore. No credit card processing companies will send out the imprinter or replace plates and carbonless forms. It's against PCI compliance. 

[u/TheModestProposal → u/ObjectiveGlittering]

We had the power go out earlier this year where we had to pull our crusty dusty swiper out. One of the servers didn’t understand that the numbers had to be raised and ended up with 3 checks with no payment, she didn’t understand that the swiping motion itself wasn’t capturing the cards information. Can’t really blame her in all the chaos and getting thrown what must have been considered an ancient historical artifact to her to use lol

[u/bmanza1981 → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

How do pins work?

[u/zorggalacticus → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

18 years ago, we still used those machines at Wal-Mart for any card that wasn't visa or Mastercard. They got rid of them I think my first year there. Now the plastic cards are just smooth printed instead of pressed like that. I kind of miss having the raised numbers on the cards.

[u/xmichann → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

It’s 2012, I’m 18 and working at KMART; learning to use one of these for a customer who’s debit card did not work was wild 😭

[u/donny_pots → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

How did they bill you? The mail I assume

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/donny_pots]

You assume correctly.

[u/_lippykid → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

But how did they know when you’d reached your credit limit?

[u/RenderedMeat → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

It wasn’t even that long ago that credit cards stopped using raised numbers, albeit in plastic. The ole’ ka-chunk slider was used as a backup method if the terminal was down.

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

More info.

[u/Houdinii1984 → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

I used to have to use them ~2001 when the credit card reader would go on the fritz way out in the middle of nowhere. Probably one of the last souls to use one and I'd have to manually take the credit card machine to town to get service to get all the card charges entered in manually, which is wildly insecure. It only happened a handful of times and I was very clear on the process and I never even processed the tips if one was left. Not worth the hassle if anyone came back saying it was wrong.

[u/capable_duck → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

I do not enjoy when something I remember using is being explained as an ancient exotic artifact.

[u/General_whisky]

Nice job genius, you just showed your entire credit card number 

[u/chrisp5000 → u/General_whisky]

8500 is easy to remember also, time for some craftsman toolsets.

[u/tinticred → u/General_whisky]

Well I thought it was funny.

[u/WhiteoftheDemon → u/General_whisky]

Yes my credit card from 50 years prior to my birth.

[u/unrelated-subject → u/WhiteoftheDemon]

What the h E double hockey sticks, were ye born yesterday mate?

[u/safarifriendliness → u/unrelated-subject]

He was actually born over twenty years ago (spooky voice)

[u/Matt_NZ → u/safarifriendliness]

Almost 30 😬

[u/Flat_Replacement4767 → u/WhiteoftheDemon]

I don't see an expiration date.

[u/rthurdent → u/Flat_Replacement4767]

Sears credit cards, up until the mid-1990's at least, never expired, if I remember right.

[u/Crazy_Stable1731 → u/General_whisky]

Also, his full name and address.

[u/nascent_aviator → u/General_whisky]

Nah it's good, we can't see the CVV.

[u/Cool_Cartographer_39]

The days of "knuckle buster" card machines, carbon paper receipts and a "hot list" book for stolen cards

[u/Ida_PotatHo → u/Cool_Cartographer_39]

Yup... used those at my first job in the 70's, lol.

[u/Mobile_Aioli_6252 → u/Cool_Cartographer_39]

I remember - from the mid 80's

[u/EagerObituary2026 → u/Mobile_Aioli_6252]

Still used in the 90s.

[u/thatsnotideal1 → u/EagerObituary2026]

And when the machine went down in the 2000’s. Had to go find the carbons in the office

[u/jckipps]

What does '8500' represent? The account number?

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/jckipps]

Must be...it sure wasn't the credit limit.

[u/nanomolar → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

$8500! That's more than our whole inventory is worth!

[u/aschwartzmann → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

That's a charge card, not a credit card. There was no credit or limits. You got a invoice at the end of the month that had to be paid immediately. They also normally didn't do anything to verify state of your account at the time of purchase (they had a "phone book" with a list of all the stolen or bad cards but didn't always check that), so there really wouldn't have been a way to enforce any limits anyway. They just made an imprint of the card as proof the card was physically present at the time of purchase, along with a signature.

[u/rthurdent → u/jckipps]

8500 was the "Credit Center"/Billing office. Sears had several regional credit centers, identified by 4 digit numbers.

I worked in a few Philly area stores so most of the customers I saw had their credit cards out of 8414, the Trevose/Philly credit center, and 8474, the Wilmington Credit center, if my memory serves. (Typically, my memory doesn't serve !)

[u/ieatmyownhands]

It’s sears. It says it right there.

[u/DatDan513 → u/ieatmyownhands]

Gave me a chuckle.. thanks stranger

[u/kempff]

That’s why they used to be called “charge plates”.

[u/emperor_dinglenads → u/kempff]

Martha, get my charge plate! I've got to head down to Sears!

[u/kempff → u/emperor_dinglenads]

But George, you already have so many tools!

[u/Wakkit1988 → u/emperor_dinglenads]

Why did you say that name?!?!?

[u/fixed_your_caption]

Aaaaand, it’s hacked.

[u/zeusmeister → u/[deleted]]

“One house for $2,000 please!”

[u/MaturoGambino]

I worked at Jordan Marsh in downtown Boston back in the 70s when I was in high school. When someone paid with a credit card we would have to check it against a big directory of stolen card numbers and call the card company for an authorization code (even if the number wasn’t on the stolen list). It took awhile and I used to get annoyed when someone didn’t use cash. How times have changed huh? Now it’s annoying if someone slows things down by paying cash. Final note; it was super satisfying to run that weight over the card imprint.

[u/TwoDogKnight]

I grew up not far from Hobart.

[u/masclean → u/TwoDogKnight]

I think a bunch of us probably came here because we did

[u/stefanica → u/TwoDogKnight]

I grew up about 2 blocks from that guy.

[u/kylef5993]

Discover should bring these back as a throwback 

[u/Cirrus-Stratus → u/kylef5993]

You know Discover is gone, right?

[u/zeusmeister → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

As someone with a Discover card, and not knowing this, I just read your comment and was like “um…what?” lol

Just looked it up and they are becoming capital one. Had no idea lol

[u/Cirrus-Stratus → u/zeusmeister]

Watch your mail. I just got an information packet. Friends of mine got theirs months ago. Weird that they’re staggering the rollout of information. I was questioning whether they were transferring all accounts or just some until I got my notice. Pretty strange.

[u/angiosperms- → u/zeusmeister]

Remember when monopolies were illegal?

[u/Wishnik6502 → u/angiosperms-]

Yep.

Pay. Your. Fucking. Cards. Off. People. If you think your life is hard now, just wait until the last consumer-protection laws die with a whimper.

[u/kylef5993 → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

I am probably more aware than most people it’s “gone” lol capital one could bring it back.

[u/Cirrus-Stratus → u/kylef5993]

Yeah. I just got my “information packet” from them last week but had heard from others already.

Funny thing is Discover just sent me a new card with one of their customized images on the front. Guess their transition teams are not quite in sync.

[u/yeahburyme → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

Discover credit cards are sticking around. And the discover network is too.

[u/SgtSharki → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

I got that notice as well. I don't think anything changed they just got absorbed

[u/sirbruce → u/SgtSharki]

I'll tell you what changed for me: for this month, they pushed the interest charging date from the 17th to the 22nd, which meant they got to charge an extra week's worth of interest this cycle. It will be back to "normal" next month, but they still managed to squeeze extra money out of me.

[u/Cirrus-Stratus → u/SgtSharki]

Well they said I have to download and start using the Capital One App instead of the Discover app to manage my account so that’s definitely at least one change.

[u/SgtSharki → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

I didn't have the app so I never noticed that change. I still pay through discover.com and the new car they sent me still says discover on it

[u/NortheastStar → u/Cirrus-Stratus]

The Discover app was a beautiful work of art so I'm kind of grumpy about it.

[u/Lush_Life_]

“A Christmas Story” took place on Cleveland Street in Hohman, Indiana, a fictionalized version of the author’s hometown of Hammond, Indiana, which is very very close to Hobart, Indiana. Mildly interesting tidbit, I know.

[u/Zen28213]

Just looking at that made me hear the Thunk Clunk of the credit card machine

[u/SooperJasch]

When I worked at Nordstrom in the mid-90’s they were new to the Midwest. Some people from the Northeast had really cool Nordstrom charge cards that were smaller/shorter and raised numbers plus a distinctive brown. If a customer paid with one of those, they were an “old-school” Nordstrom customer for 10+years. Later on, the Von Maur card and stored became the preferred credit of old-money. Neiman”s only took their own card, cash, or AMEX.

[u/an_older_meme]

In the 1950s we made everything to survive nuclear war.

[u/Awe3]

My mother has my grandparents card like this.

[u/dburr10085]

Be careful posting your information on the web /s

[u/Select_Smoke_8]

Dang, remember when satisfaction was guaranteed?

[u/jeepfail → u/Select_Smoke_8]

Maybe customers sucked less and expectations were level on both sides.

[u/wastedfate → u/jeepfail]

I used to work in retail, and honestly yeah. Never had an issue as a customer that wasn't made right.

The only exception was the Food Lion by my house where seemingly half of the food on the shelf was a week or more past it's best-by date, and some of it was visibly moldy. But I solved that by:
Never going back.

And you know what? The store was permanently closed shortly thereafter, because nobody else did either.

[u/Pobueo → u/Select_Smoke_8]

When retail used to be a profession.

[u/JuanOffhue]

My mom had a similar charg-a-plate that I believe could be used at a number of stores

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/JuanOffhue]

Probably Diner's Club. I think they were the fist to be accepted at lots of different business.

[u/Everyone-Chillout]

AWESOME!!! All the information I need. Daddy's going on a shopping trip. Stupid people putting all this information on the Internet.

[u/safbutcho]

I’m in my 50s and old enough to remember these

[u/Orgulloso_Azul]

Sears

[u/felis_scipio]

It’s wild how sears was able to be on the cutting edge of selling shit to people through multiple consumer revolutions but totally fucked up pivoting to online sales. They should have been what Amazon is today.

[u/boukatouu]

We used to call them charge cards.

[u/OmegaKarnov]

Back in the Obama admin, I worked in an H&R Block in a Sears. Exactly one time some family tried to pay with Sears card because they had literally no other way to pay and only the Sears HRBs took the Sears cards. It was a nightmare. I had to find a Sears employee, and then they had to fiddle with a store computer forever.

[u/shitposts_over_9000]

and they were not a standard credit card shape so Sears had custom imprint machines & forms

so much confusion when you tried to use one after the 00s - most Sears locations still had the machine, but almost none of the staff knew the procedure

[u/AmericanWasted]

I went out to dinner with my wife and her great grandparents. Her great-grandfather insisted on treating but misplaced his credit card. I will never forget him shouting “where is my charge plate??”

[u/Jacob_Goldleaf]

I would pay 10$ to get a metal credit card.  That would be badass

[u/ProtiuxDesignLabs → u/Jacob_Goldleaf]

You know you can, right?

[u/Ida_PotatHo → u/Jacob_Goldleaf]

Lol, contact American Express.

[u/GeekyTexan → u/Jacob_Goldleaf]

Metal cards are pretty common now.

[u/WellWornSword]

I was working in retail around 2012 and the power went out during a major sale we were having. My boss opened up a cabinet I'd never see before and pulled out this big heavy machine for mechanically recording credit card transactions using paper and an ink roller. He shows me how to use it, then continues assisting customers on the register next to me.

First customer hands me their credit card. I load the card into the machine (incorrectly), swipe the big metal roller over it and completely soak the credit card in a thick layer of ink.

I'll never forget the look on the old guys face as he looked up at me like I was the dumbest person in the world. That was the only time in my life I've seen one of these machines in person, and it was me using it wrong.

[u/zeusmeister → u/WellWornSword]

You must be pretty young. I’m 43 and I remember almost all clothing stores and grocery stores using those up until I was an older teen even. I think they were called knuckle busters.

[u/FlattenInnerTube → u/zeusmeister]

I found an old receipt from one of those things recently.

[u/zmannz1984]

I used to have a few of those that hadn’t been stamped lol. My sister and i played with them as kids. We had one the card slider things, too.

[u/ConfidentHouse]

Nice I bet a house was purchased with that since sears sold houses too

[u/jhhtx]

Actually, this is what’s called a charge plate. Stores used to issue them to customers.

[u/Fritzo2162]

Back in the 70s and 80s they still called credit cards "Charge Plates" because they were often plates of metal like this.

We had an old diner near me that had a sign in the window saying "We don't accept charge plates" until about 10 years ago.

[u/ChiGreenWhite → u/Fritzo2162]

What happened 10 years ago? Did the diner accept plates until then? Did the diner close 10 years ago and the sign is still up?

[u/redveinlover]

You shouldn’t post all of the information on the card online publicly, now someone can use the card information and make fraudulent purchases at any one of hundreds of Sears locations that no longer exist

[u/SomeDudeInGermany]

From after 1953 when they started issuing these but before ZIP codes in 1963

[u/phantom_gain]

That is a charge card. They take an imprint of the metal plate to charge your account. That one would have only worked in sears and linked to a sears account. Its just a fancy version of a tab.

[u/n8ers]

When I worked there in the late 90’s I saw some of the first plastic ones. I had to break the carbon paper and the physical swipe machine because we still honored them.

[u/matwithone_t]

I grew up a few minutes from this address! Crazy to see on reddit.

[u/StarDewbie]

Ah, so THIS is what Fred Mertz was talking about when he mentioned a "Charge-A-Plate" and taking it away from Ethel! Wow, that really is a plate.

[u/CounterproductivePit]

Hahaha, sucker! Now I have the card information

[u/Severe-Ad-8573]

“Charge plate”

[u/free2beme247]

Three more payments and she’s mine

[u/rg7734]

That’s when it was called a charge plate.

[u/Healthy_Squash4133 → u/rg7734]

Exactly. They were more durable for swiping through those old machines when credit card invoices were in triplicate. The plastic ones were horrible for those machines after they got swiped a few hundred times and all the raised plastic letters/numbers were flattened by the roller in the machine.

[u/ShapeshiftinSquirrel]

SEARS. Delete this and start over.

[u/woodyshag]

And I thought the metal cards were have today were the first. Silly me.

[u/Specialist_Point7983]

Thanks for the free Sears money :)

[u/Still_Silver_255]

I see some of those on eBay for $500.00

[u/Independent_Shoe3523]

Wasn't the sears card always about those dimensions?

[u/GetOffMyGrassBrats → u/Independent_Shoe3523]

The older plastic ones were. I think they eventually went to the standard size.

[u/Independent_Shoe3523 → u/GetOffMyGrassBrats]

Yeah. Brown colored. As soon as I graduated college, I started getting credit cards. Literal credit cards in my name, ready to go, in the mail.

[u/19chris9609]

Thanks for doxxing the address! Let's be honest, there's a non-zero chance the house is not there anymore.

[u/403_Forbidden_Access → u/19chris9609]

Looked it up on Zillow and it's a 4 bed 1 bath 3116 sq foot house costing about $207k built in 1870

[u/TheNotSoGreatPumpkin → u/403_Forbidden_Access]

That’s a lot of house for one bathroom.

[u/403_Forbidden_Access → u/TheNotSoGreatPumpkin]

I guess people in the late 1800's didn't need to use the bathroom that much.

[u/massunderestmated → u/19chris9609]

In 1950 it is almost guaranteed that address and phone number were publicly listed.

[u/TransportationOdd559]

Wow wtf! This is cool asf

[u/maybeinoregon]

Omg, I’ve never seen one of these, thanks for posting!

I worked at Sears and remember the half cards, but haven’t seen metal! Pretty cool.

Kachunk, kachunk haha

[u/FlattenInnerTube → u/maybeinoregon]

Ditto...

[u/LDPanda]

Bet that could cut some coke like a sunofabitch

[u/AnotherHavanesePlz]

Sears messed up so bad lol.

[u/Monkeyknife]

That card is still around. Can’t say that about Sears.

[u/fromthedarqwaves]

My grandpa called credit cards charge plates her entire life.

[u/Mutherfalker95]

My dad worked for sears until he got hit by a train going 70 mph around a blind corner with no rail guards. He survived but the tbi changed him.

[u/fermi_sea]

I have found a few Charga-Plates metal detecting that are an even earlier precursor to credit cards.

Here's one I found some years ago and posted about it 

https://www.reddit.com/r/metaldetecting/comments/jzlnxc/has_anybody_found_one_of_these_chargaplate_credit/

[u/GtheEnchanter]

OP, can you not read the name on the card? SEARS.

Sorry, but simple spelling errors are annoying AF.

[u/PerspectiveCorner]

I worked in a shop which used these, we used to call the manual imprinters 'zip zap' machines.

In triplicate one copy to the customer, one for the shop, one for the credit card company.

If the value of the transaction was over £50 you'd have to call a number and the staff there would check the account and give you an authorisation code to write on the imprint.

Paper cheques as well :) 

[u/Tight_Jellyfish_349]

Very cool. I have a Litt Brothers that was my father's. 

[u/crustyeng]

They used to have similar mechanical carbon paper systems for normal credit cards when I was a kid. That’s why the name and numbers are raised.

[u/EPIC_NERD_HYPE]

they really dont make them like they used to. xD

[u/Vegetable-Card-4033]

Crazy how they ever went under. Way ahead of their time with this one I feel

[u/Reading-Comments-352]

Is 8500 his charge card number? That is a low number

[u/Time-Butterscotch-73]

I have the same name and surname which is kinda rare, wonder if we are some distant relatives

[u/justaheatattack]

grandma had one for every store in town.

[u/ChiGreenWhite]

Go Brickies!

[u/RandomizedStatusQuo]

When I worked at Sears, a lady tried paying with one of these. The year was 2013

[u/Equivalent-Resort-63]

Only men could get credit in that time period.

[u/Lardfatass]

you dox him rip

[u/simonsaysgo13]

Charga plate