Old magnetic-stripe SNAP cards are expected to stop working Nov. 9 in the 20 Virginia localities that received chip cards first, Cardinal News reports. More than 145,000 chip cards went out to households in that pilot group, and about 72,000 had been activated as of Oct. 9. That leaves a large number of households that were still carrying the old card, with only days left before it goes dark.
The question for those households is plain: is the card in the wallet the old one or the new one? The new card came in the mail with instructions to activate it and set a new PIN, and the old PIN does not carry over, according to the state’s chip card site. Anyone who never opened the envelope, or opened it and never activated the card, can still call the local department of social services before the old card is shut off.
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Which localities are on the Nov. 9 clock?
The state’s site lists the pilot localities as Chesterfield and Colonial Heights, Fairfax City and County, Lynchburg, Madison, Manassas Park, Middlesex, New Kent, Norfolk, Northampton, Orange, Patrick, Portsmouth, Radford, Richmond City, Roanoke City, Smyth, Surry, Warren, Washington and Wythe. Cards for those places were expected to reach mailboxes by Oct. 1.
The first chip cards were mailed to the pilot group on Sept. 11, Cardinal News reported in September. Households outside those localities are not on the Nov. 9 schedule. Their cards are still on the way, and their old cards stay active until their own cutoff.
What decides the day a card stops?
The rule on the state’s site is a count, not a calendar date. The old magnetic stripe card “will automatically deactivate 60 days after the new card is mailed,” it says. Because the count starts on the day each household’s card was mailed, the cutoff can differ from one household to the next, which is why Nov. 9 is described as the expected date.
For households that already switched, nothing more is needed. The chip card works at the register as the old card did, and the state says it will not change what a household receives or when. For everyone else, the old card is a card with a closing date.
The state says only the card technology is changing. Benefit amounts and the monthly issuance schedule stay the same, and benefits are not supposed to be interrupted during the switch. A household that activates the chip card keeps buying groceries the way it did before, with a new PIN at the register.
The activation numbers show why the date matters. About 72,000 cards had been activated as of Oct. 9 against more than 145,000 mailed, Cardinal News reported, so roughly half were in use by then, though the two counts are not from the same day. In Lynchburg, most residents had their cards by the end of September, but not everyone had activated them, and the city did not have its own activation count.
What if the old card stops before the new one works?
The first step is activation. The enclosed instructions walk through activating the card and choosing a new PIN, and the state advises changing that PIN often and never sharing it. A household that cannot find its new card, or never received one, can contact the local department of social services or the EBT call center at 866-281-2448.
A replacement chip card costs $4.99, deducted from the household’s EBT account, the state says. Questions about the rollout also go to VAchip@dss.virginia.gov. The state asks people to confirm their mailing address, phone number and email with their local office, because a card sent to an old address is a card that never gets activated.
Why did Virginia swap the cards at all?
Skimming is the reason. Thieves put illegal devices inside card readers that capture the data from a magnetic stripe, then spend the benefits loaded on the card. Embedded chips are more resistant to that kind of copying, Cardinal News reported. Duke Storen, the commissioner of the Virginia Department of Social Services, has said that “the threat of benefit theft is real.”
Virginia is one of eight states that have issued chip-enabled cards, according to a September state news release cited by Cardinal News. Cardinal News also noted that a USDA proposal published Oct. 23 would eventually require every state to adopt chip cards, with comments accepted until Dec. 22. That rule is only a proposal and changes nothing for a household today.
When does the rest of Virginia get chip cards?
Mailing to everyone outside the pilot continues in phases from October through December, the state says, and every Virginia EBT customer should have a chip card by Dec. 31. Cardinal News reported that mailing to localities outside the pilot was set to begin at the end of October.
The same 60-day rule applies to each of those households. A card mailed at the end of October would put the old card’s cutoff around the end of December, and one mailed on Dec. 31 would push it to about March 1. Anyone in a later phase who sees a new card arrive should treat the date on the envelope as the start of the count.
Old card still in the drawer after Nov. 9?
A card with a magnetic stripe is the kind skimmers copy, and a Virginia household that waits past the cutoff can end up with no working card and a replacement fee. Account takeovers work on a similar idea, using stolen login details to drain money held at a bank.
Scam-Proof Your Accounts in a Weekend does not touch EBT cards. It covers the accounts around them, including how to lock your bank logins with two-step login, alerts and a verbal password, in a 13-page guide that lays out ten moves in weekend order.
Get the 10-move weekend guide to locking bank logins with alerts and two-step login →
This article was produced with AI assistance and edited for accuracy against the sources linked above.
Warren Cohen is a finance writer based in Phoenix, Arizona, covering personal finance topics including credit, banking, and beginner investing. He earned his degree in business administration from Arizona State University and began his career working in consumer finance, where he gained direct experience with lending and credit systems. He now writes for personal finance websites and fintech platforms, focusing on clear, practical content that helps readers make informed financial decisions.
