The use of a common credit card on Ebay?

Use paypal. Otherwise a zillion strangers will have your card info.

That's another reason to buy through Amazon: single trusted outfit bills your card.

On a sunny day (Sun, 23 Feb 2014 10:55:48 -0500) it happened "Maynard A. Philbrook Jr." wrote in :

I wou;d not use a credit card on ebay. there is a lot of strange companies and people there. It is safer to get a paypal account, they give you money back guarantee too if you do not receive things within some time. That way only one identity has your credit card number and they are big enough to pay if something goes wrong, and you know who to contact.

It could possibly be the credit card company's fraud software guessing incorrectly that the card has been compromised.

Happened to me yesterday at Lamps Plus... declined. I called the CC company on the spot to raise holey hell... took them some transferring me around before it got sorted out... first big charge since renewal card was activated. Then they authorized the purchase.

As for EBay, create a Paypal account that allows you to use whatever card you want, but the end vendor doesn't see the transaction details... they just get paid via their own Paypal account. (For safety's sake I use a card that I purposefully reject credit limit increases... keeping it at $1K... limits my exposure.) ...Jim Thompson

your

it seems ebay is pretty much the same most of the time, it is just paypal i nstead of amazon that handles the card

-Lasse

I don't know, but I do know that once Paypal has decided they don't like even a valid card (for example, if you move it between accounts a couple times) they will never un-blacklist it.

If you don't like it, you're more than welcome to go #$$#* yourself.

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

After a buyer purchases more than a few thousand dollars worth of goods PayPal forces the buyer to create a PayPal account. PayPal blacklists the credit card used for the purchases until an account is created. A Paypal account requires a routing number and a bank account number. This is dangerous because wire transfers (ACH Network) offer little, if any, protection against a fraudulent draw down of a naked bank account. PayPal loves wire transfers because they get paid immediately and avoid the risk that you won't pay up.

To satisfy PayPal, open a brand new bank account, a dedicated account that you use just for PayPal. Put the minimum amount of dollars into your dedicated account. Everything in your dedicated account is at risk, but that's the price one must pay to use PayPal.

Your credit card company acts like an 800 pound gorilla when it comes to payments. No matter what happens they can always return your dollars (for cause, even long after the fact).

Debit cards function like a bank account. Debit cards do not come with an 800 pound gorilla.

Whenever you complete a PayPal transaction, PayPal chooses a wire transfer out of your dedicated account as its default method of payment (naturally). Just select your credit card as the method of payment and you're good-to-go with an 800 pound guerrilla who's got your back.

Very good information. I'd just like to add that when you use your ATM card at a retailer, you *are* protected by the 800# gorilla, as long as you *DON'T* use your PIN (assumes a VISA or MC branded ATM card). If you use the PIN, it's cleared through the ACH network and you lose that protection. You have to beat any fraudulent payments out of your bank.

On Sunday, February 23, 2014 10:55:48 AM UTC-5, Maynard A. Philbrook Jr. wr ote:

As usual you're feckless little simpleton who can accomplish the simplest t ask. If the buyer allows you to select VISA then "Credit card or debit card proc essed through the seller's Internet merchant account." This means it's not ebay, it's the seller's internet VISA merchant provider, of which there are many many many many...the one thing for sure is ebay is out of it at that point, and there can be a lot of reasons why the card is refused at either end of the transaction.

What an f'ing joke you are.

Not true. You're mis-con-screwing fraudulent use of your card number as opposed to a retailer being obstinate about taking returns for good reason.

Several times I've _easily_ had my bank reverse a charge when a retailer didn't want to play nice.

(Of course it always helps to have a big balance in your account(s) :) ...Jim Thompson

WRONG. I just went through this with my bank. Fortunately, the perp didn't get the PIN so VISA took the hammer and my bank was very nice in getting the 800# gorilla to pay. If it had been their dime, they even said it would be a RPITA to recover.

The two transactions are *very* different, both practically and the way they're treated under the law.

That's up to your bank. They can volunteer to do anything they want.

Things are friendlier in the West... seems to be that way when everyone is armed >:-} ...Jim Thompson

The point is that the two uses of debit cards are *very* different. They are cleared differently and your legal protections are different.

Poor baby. Where do you live? New Yaaawk City or New Joisey? ...Jim Thompson

He lives in that sh_thole former textile town Willimantic CT.

On a sunny day (Mon, 24 Feb 2014 18:27:33 -0700) it happened Jim Thompson wrote in :

All the unfriendly ones are short dead?

That must be something new. Unless things have changed, paypal doesn't check a credit card at all when you set up an account. I had a credit card that I canceled due to it was hacked and paypal accepted it to start an account. Mind you they knew this card was hacked because I had contacted security. They only check is good once a transaction is made.

To explain further, all these credit cards have an algorithm to verify that the number COULD be a credit card. Think of it as a hashing scheme, or check bits. So when you give paypal a credit card, they see if the number fits the formula. That is it.

This is a problem in that hackers know the formula, so they can make up numbers that could be a credit card numbers. You would think that isn't a big deal since no charge is made, but there have been issues where using such a number has been handy for hackers.

I have a combination credit card, debit card, and ATM card. This of course is stupid. So I have both the credit card feature and debit card feature each set to $1 limit, then use credit cards that are not associated with my bank. This lets my bank know how much I think that triple feature card is stupid, plus the credit cards unassociated with my bank makes it hard for some hacker to take real money, i.e. from my account, versus funny money at the credit card company.

Jim is dead wrong on the use of debit cards. They have no protection. Never use them. In fact, never use the ATM for anything other than withdrawing money, and preferably from a bank ATM and not some mystery ATM in a store.

The only reason to use a debit card is if you are not worthy of credit. Even then, these banks have some sort of deal where you can deposit money with them and that is your credit limit. I don't know exactly how that works since I've never had a credit issue, but they do this for people trying to establish credit after bankruptcy.

They keep a record of every card you've used in the past. Like all these databases, it might have a better memory than you do.

I imagine most people only would enter their credit card number when they wanted to send money.

I understand you can buy real credit card numbers cheaply.

The verification schemes have gotten more complex. I sometimes have to (long story, but take my word for it) enter in a non-existent address in nowhere Iowa (population ~100) to get my CC to be accepted.

--sp

Oh really?

Jamie