i dont work in the service industry these days, but i did used to work in restaurants/bars during when i was at university....i will relay to you one of the restaurant owner's policy regarding checking credit card signatures
i was asked one day by the owner why i was checking the signature on a customer's card.....my answer "to check that it matched"
i was told in no uncertain terms that he didnt care if it matched or not....if the transaction was approved then it was ok by him....he did not want any of his staff to decline a customer's credit card because the staff member believed it was not a match....as you say, his reasoning was because none of the staff had been trained in comparing handwriting/signatures, so who are they to make the decision of whether the signature is a match or not
if the card was indeed stolen, then the owner of the card would be refunded of any transactions that took place after it was stolen, they would not be out of pocket.....similarly, the restaurant owner would not be out of pocket.....therefore there was no valid reason to check signatures
