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Associate swipe cards with Equitrac accounts

If your users swipe magnetic cards to identify themselves at the printer or copier through an external XCP device, use the Card Swipe wizard to add the swipe card account associations to the Equitrac database.

This wizard enables you to swipe a magnetic swipe card on an XCP device, or on a simple wedge card reader with keyboard interface. The wedge card reader option is mandatory if you are using card readers that do not interface with a PC. Contact Equitrac Technical Support for a list of compatible wedge card readers.

For XCP devices only, disconnect the network cable from the card reader when using the Card Swipe wizard. The only cable you can attach to the card reader during this procedure is the nine-pin serial cable. If both the serial and network cables are connected for the wizard, you risk registering unusable characters from the XCP device in the PIN information.

To add account identifications for magnetic cards:

  1. Before you start the Card Swipe Wizard, you must shut down the Device Control Engine.
  2. Select Start > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services. Right-click the EQ DCE Service in the right pane and select Stop.
  3. For XCP devices only, ensure that you have configured the COM port for the card reader correctly in the operating system BIOS and Control Panel. For all other devices, proceed to the next step.
  4. Use a nine-pin cable to connect the card reader to the serial port.
  5. On an administrative workstation, browse to Programs Files\Nuance\Equitrac\Tools. Select the Card Swipe Wizard.
  6. In the wizard’s first dialog box, select a Card swipe unit. If you select XCP, specify the serial port to which the card reader is connected.
  7. Enter the Windows network name of the computer that hosts the accounting server. Click Next.
  8. Swipe the magnetic card.
  9. In the following dialog box, verify that the card reader has successfully retrieved the primary PIN data from the card. Optionally, you can specify a secondary PIN for the card. Click Next.

    10. The card reader reads the primary PIN from the card based on the card swipe position you configure in Web System Manager > Devices > Terminals. See Control Terminals for details. The secondary PIN is like a password for the user. If you use the secondary PIN, you must also configure Equitrac to prompt for it. See User Authentication for details.

  10. In the following dialog box, select the type of account that Equitrac associates with this card. In the accompanying text box, specify the name of the account and click Verify. The wizard verifies that the specified account exists in the Equitrac database and displays the account description.
  11. To continue using the wizard to configure more cards with Equitrac accounts, click Another card.
  12. Click Finish to exit the wizard.
  13. Open Start > Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Services. Right-click the EQ DCE Service in the right pane and select Start.

The account identifications appear in Accounts.