• Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Blog
  • Contact
  • Legal
    • Terms of Service
    • Privacy Policy

All Things Pondered Here

Pondering Many Things....

Credit Cards

Accepting Credit Cards On Your Website

July 8, 2012 by Dave

I have found, through experience, that is best to offer as many different kinds of payment options as you can to your customers.   We do accept credit cards at our online store:  ToothyGrinsStore.com

There will be some customers who want to use paypal, some  google checkout and there are also those who will want to use a credit card.

As a merchant or seller it is your job to accommodate your customers to the best of your ability.

There Are Customers Who Want Pay By Credit Card

There seem to be people who will not view your site as legitimate unless you take credit cards.

There is actually some logic to this.

In order to accept credit cards, you need to have a credit worthy business in order to setup a merchant account which will initially be based upon your personal credit rating.

Which Credit Cards Should You Accept

You should accept as many kinds of credit cards as you can or that you find reasonable.

Some people love to use American Express, others love to use Discover.

Most people have a Visa or MasterCard, but often they prefer to use their Discover due to the cash back programs involved.

It has traditionally been more expensive to the Merchant to accept Discover card but that appears to be changing.

Credit Card Fraud

For online merchants it is particularly important to protect yourself against online fraud.

There are several ways to do this.

One of the best ways is to set up your system to require that the person puts in a security code.   This is the 3 or 4 digit number that each card has that is NOT part of the actually credit card number.

By requiring customers to put this number in you are protecting both them and yourself (as the merchant).   The security number helps to insure that the person has the actual credit card in their possession.

When you here of theft of credit card information, the thieves may have the actual number and expiration date of a card but they will NOT have the security number.  This means that if someone stole a credit card and tried to use it at your store to get free merchandise, they would have a hard time pulling that off without the security code.

Shipping Fraud

There has been a scam going on for quite a while where the scammers try to get you to agree to them using their own shipping provider.   In order for this scam to work, they have to place a large order or it would not make sense for someone to send their own shipping company in.   In this case, they try to get you to pay some sort of fee for the shipping that they will then ‘refund’ to you.

Obviously, you never want to get involved in this type of transaction.

Teletype Relay Fraud

Due to the laws in certain states of the United States, many scam artists have learned to use the Teletype Relay systems that were designed for the hearing impaired.

The reason they can get away with this is due to the strict rules that regulate these systems.   The operators, even if they are aware that there is a scam in progress are forbidden to say anything or make any comments about the call whatsoever.    They are only allowed to relay the information of the conversation back and forth regardless of the content.

Some of the scammers will use this method to hide the fact that they are not native English speakers.   They will also attempt to make you feel sorry for them because they are deaf.

Interesting Notes About Credit Card Numbers

American Express was actually the original credit card and system created.  Therefore,  American Express cards all start with the number “3”.

Visa has become a much larger system but came after American Express, therefore those credit card numbers all start with the number “4”

MasterCard credit cards all start with the number “5”.

Discover, is the relatively late comer to the credit card world and therefore, those cards all start with the number “6”.

I hope you have enjoyed this article as well as the others here on All Things Pondered.  In any case, please leave a comment below to let me know what you think.

About The Author

You might also enjoy:

Ecommerce

Affiliate Marketing

Announce Your Site, Business, Blog or Non-Profit to the World

Filed Under: All Posts, Credit, Credit Cards Tagged With: accepting credit cards, credit cards, merchant account

Credit Card Company Complaint Options

February 18, 2012 by Dave

Sometimes you run across a credit card company that is not very helpful with addressing wrongs that have been done to you.

This could range from unreasonable fees to being double charged for items to any number of other issues. I’m sure you can think of one or two scenarios yourself.

The first step is to contact the customer service of the credit card company. Their number is usually printed on the back of your credit card.

Keep notes of who you talk to, what was said and the date and time of the call(s).

If things are not going well, ask to talk to a supervisor. Good customer service centers always have supervisors you can talk to.

If the agent refuses, that may be the first sign that this company is not good at handling customer problems.

You can try looking up the corporate office for credit card companies as well.

If all of this fails to provide the help that you need, then it is time to go a little further.

This is also where the detailed records that you previously kept will come in handy.

The more documentation you can provide either to customer service managers or government agencies is going to aid your case.

Organize the data in a clear and concise way that illustrates what happened and how your attempts at using the ‘normal’ channels for help failed.

1. Use the US government website to lodge your complaint (see below)

2. Use your State’s Attorney General Office as well as the State Attorney General’s office of the State the company’s corporate office is in. (see example further down the page)

Here is a web page for a US government website where you can file a complaint against any credit card issuer that has crossed the line as far as what is right and morally acceptable.

https://help.consumerfinance.gov/app/creditcard/ask

You can log a complaint against credit card companies there and you can also get a tracking number.

They have a large section of categories for complaints that (at the time of this writing) include:

Advertising and Marketing

Application processing delays

APR or interest rate (some companies are quite ridiculous in what they charge)

Arbitration

Balance Transfers

Balance Transfer Fees

Bankruptcy

Billing Disputes

Billing Statements

Cash Advance

Cash Advance Fee

Closing/ Cancelling Account

Collection Debt Dispute

Collection Practices

Convenience Checks

Credit Determination

Credit Card Payment / Debt Protection

Credit Line Increase / Decrease

Credit Reporting

Customer Service / Customer Relations

Delinquent Accounts

Forbearance / Workout Plans

Identity Theft / Fraud / Embezzlement

Late Fees

Overlimit Fees

Other Fees

Payoff Process

Rewards

Sale of Accounts

Transaction Issues

Unsolicited Issuance of Credit Card

Even if your complaint does not fall into this rather extensive list, you can leave your complaint anyway.

Sometimes you need a third party to intervene on your behalf.

When customer service is stubborn and unhelpful and you cannot get injustices corrected, perhaps you do need such help.

Remember, credit card companies are there to provide a service and they make a lot of money off people like you and me.

If there is a problem, they should definitely take care of it. If not, perhaps you can transfer your balance to another credit card company? Hopefully, that will be one that provides better service.

What I said here is stated in general and does not apply specifically to any individual credit card company.

In addition, the attorney general for every state has a consumer protection role and function. They will often write a letter to the company that gets A LOT MORE attention than your personal complaint to the company.

You should exhaust other options first and only turn to the attorney general when you feel there is little other option.

Each state has its own Attorney General. As an example, here is some information for the Attorney General of The State of Virginia:

the State of Virginia can be found here: https://www.oag.state.va.us/Consumer%20Protection/index.html

The site states: ” Individual complaints play an important role in notifying the Attorney General about possibly deceptive or otherwise illegal practices taking place in Virginia, which can lead to enforcement actions or legislative initiatives; however, the Attorney General’s office is not the central clearinghouse for consumer complaints in Virginia. The Virginia Office of Consumer Affairs (“OCA”), one of our client agencies within the Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, serves this role. “

In an issue unrelated to credit cards, I was having trouble with a heating and cooling company.

They even told me that their owner was on vacation when I asked to talk to him. That same owner later told me that he was not on vacation.

So his employee lied to me.

Anyway, they ignored my calls for help until I contacted the Attorney Generals of two different states.

This was because I lived in a different state than their office was in.

I got very prompt service after that and their top worker came out to fix my problem. He discovered additional problems as well and admitted that his workers had not done a good job.

He also admitted that he did not inspect this job the way he inspects other jobs.

The moral of the story is that it sometimes pays to contact the attorney general when you are having a problem.

About The Author

If you think the information on this page will be helpful to others – share it:

Google

Filed Under: Credit, Credit Cards, Financial Freedom Tagged With: complaining about credit card companies, credit card complaints, credit card issues, credit consumer protection

Capital One Credit Company Corporate Office Address And Telephone

February 18, 2012 by Dave

A quick search on Capital One complaints yields quite a few negative comments about the customer service of Capital One.

It appears that many people are unable to get satisfaction by calling the customer service line provided on the back of Capital One credit cards.

If you are among them, here is the address and phone number for the corporate office.

Address:

1680 Capital One Drive
McLean, Virginia 22102

Telephone number:   (703) 720-1000

Hopefully, you will find someone at corporate that is more willing to help than the regular customer service line.

It is always a good idea to keep detailed record of the people you have spoken with, the time of the call and what they said.

You should also discuss what the are putting in their official notes as well and make note of that.

If you keep track of everyone you talked to and what was said and the date and time of each conversation, you may have a better chance of getting the help you deserve.

Don’t give up – especially if you are 100% in the right!

About The Author

If you think the information on this page will be helpful to others – share it:

Filed Under: Bad Credit, business, Credit, Credit Cards Tagged With: corporate office, credit card

Primary Sidebar

Suggested Reading

Read Zhuan Falun

Search