Obama Says Credit Card Was Denied in NYC

[IDemo]

Source: NBC

Not even the president of the United States is immune to the embarrassment of a declined credit card, apparently.

While signing an executive order aimed to help protect consumers from financial fraud on Friday, President Barack Obama revealed he recently had his credit card declined at a New York City restaurant.

“It turned out, I guess, I don't use it enough to so they thought there was some fraud going on,” Obama said. “Fortunately, Michelle had hers.”

Read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/barack-obama/obama-says-credit-card-was-denied-nyc-n228251

[unblock]

1. i wish people would stop referring to a declined credit card as an "embarassment"

once upon a time, sure, it usually meant maxed out or worse.

but these days, the credit card companies have put their fraud detection into overdrive so there's you can't take it as anything other than a routine annoyance.

[freshwest]

8. Yes, sometimes my bank calls me up if I make a large purchase. I've had fraudulent charges before

Last edited Fri Oct 17, 2014, 09:06 PM - Edit history (1)

which they promptly took off the balance and stopped the companies, changed my account number several times in a row to throw the crooks off the track.

It took almost a year and didn't cost me anything. There were some weird charges coming through, like an electric scooter. I'd never even looked up one online. It all came from a single online purchase that didn't go through, so I forgot about it until all this stuff began showing up.

Guess they sold the information to thieves, or were thieves themselves. Now I only buy online from Amazon.

[George II]

15. Even Amazon isn't safe - I had a charge for an online download of a "Tips" book for a camera....

....that I didn't even own. It was only $15 but it happened.

[unblock]

16. amazon in fact is a prime (groan) target for fraud

because anyone can order online from anywhere, it doesn't look as suspicious as, say, a purchase in alaska from someone who lives in connecticut.

[CreekDog]

33. lots of times a small purchase is done to test if the card is usable

you can be sure if the small charge goes through, a larger one will follow if nothing is done to stop it in the interim.

[Tarheel_Dem]

30. +1. "sometimes my banks calls me up if I make a large purchase"

[madokie]

38. Our bank has done that on several occasions

when we've make a purchase out of the normal. My question is who decides whats normal and who at the bank has time to track our purchases anyway
I mean what the fuck
I buy online using paypal and keep a separate account just for paypal. When I make a purchase I transfer money to that account to cover it and thats it. I usually keep a few bucks extra in there just in case I wake in the middle of the night or on a Sunday and want to buy some piddly shit.

[freshwest]

39. Bank only does it if several hundred dollars are involved with someone I've never bought from.

Having been the victim of ID theft over a score of years ago, with someone accumulating over $30K of non-secured debt using my name and ss#, and then the spat of thousands of dollars of charges the scammers I mentioned in my post tried on me, I find no fault with the criteria my bank uses.

I have as others no the thread have said, called them when going out of town and planning ot make a lot of purchases while traveling. I've had no problems with my bank on any matter that was not resolved by a visit or call to them, they have stood between me and vendors who refused to stop debiting my account after they went out of business. The bank refunded all their charges and that was that.

Others have different tales. I am in a very low income bracket so I'm not getting special treatment of any kind and am exceedingly cheap about everything because I have to be.

[csziggy]

25. A purchase with my card was declined. The seller was in Australia

So the credit card company wouldn't authorize the purchase. Even when I explained that the charge was for a subscription to a magazine! Then because my husband is the primary name on the card, they wouldn't let me authorize the payment. Since every check ever written for payments to the card were signed by me, that pissed me off.

That card doesn't get used anymore - they keep sending "special offers" which are never opened and go straight into the shredder.

[yellowcanine]

2. My credit card used to get declined every time I went on a motorcycle trip.

Apparently making small purchases at a gasoline pump several states away from home was a fraud trigger. A call to the customer service # cleared it right up.

[OnlinePoker]

3. If I'm going on a trip out of my area, I call ahead

I let them know where I'll be going and when I expect to be back. I've never had a problem using my card anywhere on earth when I've done this.

[Hekate]

17. Same here. I also tell them what kind of max charge is likely

Just came back from a trip to the other coast with my sis, and we split most charges down the middle. In places she didn't want to use her card I used mine, and it worked great. I just wanted my card carrier to know that I was going far out of my own region, but that personal charges were highly unlikely to exceed $300-400, and they could call my stick-at-home hubby if in doubt. I've done that for about 15 years now.

[jeff47]

20. Another thing that can work

I went on a trip, and tried to use my debit/credit card as credit. Credit was declined until I used it once as debit. From that point on, credit worked. I presume the bank figured out it really was me since I entered my PIN for the debit transaction.

[closeupready]

4. I use cash - if anything is an embarrassment, it's holding up the line

when you are purchasing $7.50 worth (or whatever) of groceries in the neighborhood deli because you have no cash, you are in debt up to your eyeballs, and the only liquidity you have is with your credit card provider.

[whatthehey]

6. Strange - card transactions always faster than cash ones for me

Especially as low level purchases need no signature. And I have plenty of liquidity thanks - partly (small part, but hey) because I get rebates on card use that cash users will never see.

[closeupready]

7. When I'm at the local deli, college kids in expensive clothes ALWAYS

are holding up the line charging their heirloom tomatoes to their credit cards (which are probably simply household accounts on mommy/daddy's cards).

[Rainforestgoddess]

11. I don't carry cash and only use a credit card for online

If you use debit the majority of the time, a lack of cash doesn't indicate debt load.

[riqster]

9. That kind of thing is a plus in my view.

Fraud prevention is a good thing.

[elleng]

22. I agree,

and I tell them I appreciate their vigilance when they call and ask me whether the charge is legit.

[Rozlee]

34. What I don't like is when my bank doesn't call and just freezes my debit card.

Especially when I'm running low on gas in the mountains of WV where cell phone reception is lousy to call them. That's what happened once when I purchased several Kindle books online, over twenty, and they locked my card for 24 hours. That's just routine, they told me, when so many purchases are made online or purchases on the card exceed a certain limit over a certain amount of merchants. But, it's cold comfort when your gas tank is on a quarter full and your card is turned down to fill it.

[elleng]

36. Yes, I agree with you,

that would indeed be 'cold comfort.'

[skippy66]

10. The credit card readers are racist!

[CatWoman]

14. wait

wut?

[Hekate]

19. I hope it enjoys its stay. nt

[Skittles]

26. allow me to explain

it's a racist person's way of saying, hey, you bring race into everything!

[Reter]

43. And a jury voted 4-3 to keep it

Ridiculous.

[BeyondGeography]

46. The only good thing I would say about that jury

is at least it was close.

[BillZBubb]

27. skip along skippy!

[Cha]

32. I don't think it's the credit card readers that are being racist.

[BeyondGeography]

35. Haha...skippy so funny

Got any more where that came from?

[IronLionZion]

41. Are you lost?

[Drunken Irishman]

12. I've done fraud prevention for a major credit card company.

It's a pain when they're denied - but it is for a good reason. They have computers that like to single out certain transactions that may look out of the ordinary of your typical spending patterns. The stop can be an inconvenience - but not nearly the inconvenience of someone using your card for unauthorized purchases!

[mercuryblues]

21. what do

you make of this scenario?

I go to Florida several times a year. I go to NYC maybe once every 5 years. My credit card was declined in Fl. because I was out of my spending comfort zone. I called the company and a suspicious purchase was on there. I didn't want to deal with it while on vacation, so I just put a hold on it. I get my bill in the mail, lo and behold while I was in Fl. someone in NYC racked up $20,000 on my card. Remember there was also (supposed to be) a hold on it. Also my charging habits are to not charge more than I can afford to pay off at the end of the month. So why wasn't the company suspicious over such a spending spree?

[csziggy]

29. Most of the time I appreciate the fraud prevention

Twice it got to major annoyance levels.

One card denied a charge in Australia - that's sort of understandable since we've never been out of the USA. But it was for a magazine subscription, entered online. The credit card company never contacted me about it - the magazine publisher sent an message about the denial of charges. When the credit card company was contacted, they would not allow me to authorize the payment, even though I am one of two signers for the account, every payment check was signed by me, and they issued me a card every two years. My husband called to add me as a person who could authorize payments and they would not allow that. According to the person he spoke to, only one person can be the one to authorize on each account. They wanted to open a separate account for me. I think it was a way to dilute our accumulated points. That card got put away and every offer from them goes in the shredder.

The other time was while we were building our house. I was ready to order appliances and cabinets and knew the charge would be substantial so I called into the credit card company to pre-authorize the charge. I told them them the vendor, the approximate amount, and the date I would be putting in the order. I placed the order and two days later got a call from the vendor - charges denied. Sure enough, calling ahead with ALL the information was not sufficient - after I called they located my notification in the file. As a result of the credit card company screw up, my order was delayed for a month since the vendor only ships to my area once a month and I had missed the shipping date.

Aside from those two times, every other possible fraud call I've gotten was completely reasonable and the fraud prevention people were great!

[otohara]

13. Fraud Protection - It Happened To Us

my son was in GA when he bought a new computer and to us in Japan at a hotel.

We pay our balance every month, have for 32 years.

They don't budge.

[JPZenger]

18. I was irritated at a frozen credit card... until...

I was irritated that twice my credit card company froze one of my cards because I used it in AN ADJACENT STATE. But then I was very happy when my bank instantly froze my son's debit card when someone tried to clean out his bank account.

Check with your bank and find out if they provide fraud protection for your debit card. Under federal law, there is much less protection against debit card fraud than credit card fraud. You don't need a PIN to make online transactions with a debit card.

[PADemD]

23. When I get emails from Barack Obama,

Hotmail puts them in my junk folder because they think it's spam.

[Man from Pickens]

24. had a card reissued by bank recently

was apparently a "high risk" card due to recent corporate data spills

As I haven't seen any actual issue with the card, I'm guessing that there is more proactive dealing with these issues now that they affect tens of millions of people at once.

[greiner3]

28. My credit union notified me a few days after Home Depot confirmed that their databases had been hack

ed that there had been a known fradulent charge on my card and they had canceled it and had a new one in a week.

Screw banks, Republicans, a lot of cops, Fox, Home Depot, did I say Republicans?

Just wanted to get that off of my chest.

[davidpdx]

31. I'm not sure if this is the same in the US

But where I live outside the country if you don't use the card for a specific amount of time they will close the account due to inactivity.

[mwooldri]

37. Not the first President to have their card declined.

When he was serving as President, Bill Clinton had his Amex declined but only because he was trying to use an expired card. I understand this got cleared up quickly.

From the customer service end, I can say that it takes a bank executive or a prominent individual to experience a card decline for us to gather data as to why people have their card turned down.

These days credit card companies look for patterns in card usage and decide whether to approve the charge based on prior usage. That card you just called to report as lost? Don't be surprised if you find that lost card, present it at a place you go to often, and find out the charge is approved.

[former9thward]

44. If you report a credit card lost they immedialtly cancel the account

and issue you a new one with a new number.

[mwooldri]

45. That's the usual belief.

Disclaimer: I work for American Express, though my words here are my own.

In a lot of cases, one can call in, report their card as lost, and it wouldn't be able to be used again. However there are times when Amex thinks it's better business sense to approve that restaurant charge, or that convenience store charge even if the card member is presenting a previously issued number that was voided as a lost card. Factors that are considered include the type of card, the card members' purchase and credit history, and the place of business where the charge is being made. It makes sense to allow a restaurant charge go through on a platinum card members card where the card member has gone to this restaurant frequently, they charge $50,000 a month to their card, and the card was marked as lost - not stolen or the card number being used fraudulently. It's either deny the charge and embarrass the card member with their clients - or approve the charge and attempt to reach out to remind to use their proper card.

[quadrature]

40. important?...Ebola?... credit card denied? ..what do you think? ..nt

[24601]

42. In 1991, I put my wife's engagement ring on a credit card. The bank called the store and insisted

on talking to me before approving the charge. I was in her home town and it was a large purchase that was out of character for my charges (and has been ever since).

After they were satisfied it was really me, they approved the charge.

[davsand]

47. Happened to me when buying groceries.

I use a debit/credit card issued by my bank. I really don't write many checks at all since I went to it, and one of the most frequent uses of that card is groceries. I have one grocery store that is my usual place to shop, however, I do shop at other stores sometimes when it is more convenient--like if I'm buying household stuff at a Meijer store I'll just pick up groceries while I'm there.

One Sunday afternoon I was in the local Meijer and I was buying some towels that were on sale and, of course, i was also buying groceries. I got to the checkout lane and my card was declined. I had deposited a chunk of cash into that account a few days before and I KNEW without doubt that the card should have been accepted. I went ahead and dragged out the checkbook and multiple forms of ID, paid for my purchases and went to the car to call the card company.

My preferred grocery store's corporate computers got hacked and they had not notified their customers. (They didn't notify their customers for another FIVE days, which was another exercise in electronic funds issues!) The card's fraud protection had kicked in because somebody in Texas (I live in Illinois) had tried to buy a TV at a Walmart in some town I'd never heard of before. I was inconvenienced by the card being locked, but I also was protected from the bad guys. I found it difficult to say anything other than "THANK YOU!"


Laura