PIN (Personal Identification Number)

The four-digit PIN of a physical card: how it's chosen or assigned, when it becomes available, and what happens after incorrect attempts.

Physical cards have a four-digit PIN, or Personal Identification Number. A card's PIN is chosen or assigned when the card is printed. After a PIN is chosen or assigned, it can't be changed.

The PIN for each physical card is available to the cardholder on Swan's Web Banking interface. PINs aren't available on your Dashboard because only the cardholder should have easy access to the PIN for their card.

If a cardholder forgets their PIN, they can view it on your interface. If needed, you can use the viewPhysicalCardPin mutation to view the PIN yourself, which requires a user access token associated with the cardholder. If three incorrect attempts are made to enter the PIN, the card is automatically Suspended.

caution

If a cardholder shares their PIN, Swan can't take responsibility for fraud associated with that card.

Choosing a card's PIN

To allow your cardholders to choose their PIN, set the choosePin parameter to true when printing physical cards. You can set this parameter with the printPhysicalCard and addCards mutations.

If you don't add the choosePin parameter, or you set it to false, Swan assigns a PIN randomly.

You can print a physical card for another account member with the addCards mutation, allowing the member cardholder to choose their PIN by setting the choosePin parameter to true. Swan sends a text message to the member cardholder's mobile number used for Swan containing a link to choose their PIN.

Alternatively, you can use the addCard mutation to add only the virtual card. Then, the cardholder can request their own physical card and choose their PIN.

info

You can't choose a custom PIN for a cardholder who hasn't completed identification or whose account membership status is BindingUserError.

PIN availability

You can view a card's PIN as soon as it's assigned during the printing process.

• If you print a physical card before 17:00 CET/CEST (Central European [Summer] Time), the card's PIN is available by the end of the day.
• If you print a physical card after 17:00 CET/CEST, the card's PIN is available by the end of the following day.
• If you allow your cardholder to choose their PIN (choosePin is true), add an additional 24-hour delay.

Day and time

Days are measured as business days. Time is expressed with the 24-hour clock.

Incorrect PIN attempts

If the cardholder enters their PIN incorrectly three times, the physical card is blocked (status Suspended) and no payments with the physical card can be made online or in person.

A physical card blocked for three incorrect PIN attempts has the reason IncorrectPinCodeAttemptsExceeded (on the PhysicalCardSuspendedStatusInfo). You'll have to wait 24 hours before being able to unblock the physical card.

You can continue to use both virtual and digital cards while the physical card is temporarily blocked.