Recently, my firewall/anti-virus security suite with CA (Computer Associates) expired. They emailed a reminder that my coverage was expiring but would automatically renew under the terms of my agreement with them. I haven’t been too happy with their product and price, so I planned on letting it lapse, knowing that the card on file with them was expired. Well, they managed to renew my coverage and charge it to my account anyway. I was issued a new card with a new expiration date and security number on back, although the account number on the card was the same. I’ve had other companies notify me that my card on file was expiring and that I needed to update it to stay active. Should CA have been able to do this?
My credit card company allowed such a transaction when I forgot to tell the RAC that my card had been cancelled.
99% of the time, the expiration date of the card and the expiration date entered don’t have to match. At my store we keep quite a few cards on file, if they lapse all I have to do is move a date in the future and it will go through.
PS before anyone says anything, this is a different situation from the OP. I do catering and have most of my customers credit card numbers on file. Also, most of these people are daily customers. If their card expires, I just enter a date in the future and then when I see them next, I ask for the new date/card number.
American Express did this to me once. I called them and asked when the card expired. They responded. I asked what the date was on the transaction. They told me. I asked why I should be responsible for a transaction they authorized after the expiration date. Dead silence. I asked for a supervisor. They put me on hold. When they came back, they said they would credit me for that charge. Duh.
When I had an identity theft problem, I went through several Visa debit card numbers with the same bank, as well as multiple checking and savings accounts. The only way I was able to stop having things charged through these was to close all the accounts and leave that bank. They were reimbursing me for all the charges, but the accounts were still unuseable because I never could tell when there would be money in them. Checks I would write to local businesses would bounce.
Not to hijack, but on the subject, I have lost my Amex card twice, and got a new card with a new number both times. The original card had the last five numbers ending in a 47006. The second cards last five were 46005. The third card 45004. I asked Amex why in the world they would send replacements for lost cards with new numbers that obviously follow a pattern, that wouldn’t a savvy in the know thief be able to find an old cancelled card and anticipate the new number, but they didn’t have a good answer.
I had this happen to me once, and the reasoning they used was because the merchant had obtained prior authorization to charge the account, they hold it open, even if it’s expired. Makes no sense to me, either.
:eek: I am truly shocked. I always thought that they did have to match, and that this was part of the security check.
I don’t recall which company this was, but I had something being billed automatically to my Visa. When it expired, they were able to continue billing because the number was the same. I was chatting with someone about this (I didn’t mind the charge, it was a service I still wanted; I simply hadn’t updated the account in time) and he told me that many such services will simply try again with a date 3 years from the previous one on file. That works often enough.
Should they be able to do so? Really, I don’t think so. Though I don’t know how we can prevent companies from simply trying the updated date as described above. I’m assuming the merchant checks the date before even attempting the charge, so the credit card issuer wouldn’t even know they’d tried.
IIRC (and maybe I don’t), when my card expire, the new cards have new numbers. Remember that the number is the card number, not the account number.
Anyone whose new card has the same number should complain. This is a very easy-to-fix security problem.
Both my Mastercard and Amex kept the same card numbers when they were last renewed. Maybe it’s different south of the border?
My debit card expires in September (although I’ve gotten a replacement.) The other day I got a letter from Bally (my monthly payment is automatically charged) reminding me that the card is about to expire and that they need me to update the information with them.
I went to Bally’s to do so and they had the new expiration date already. Do you suppose my bank was nice enough to send it along to them? I really don’t think they should have.
Bob
Now that I think of it, I have auto-bill pay for everything I possibly can on my airline credit card (paid off monthly, thankyaverymuch). It’s been about 4 months since the old one expired, and I received the new one with the same number and different date.
I don’t imagine that my bills have gone unpaid, but maybe I’ll stop automatically shredding 100% of my mail without looking at it, just to be sure. Maybe my 802 has dropped below 600!
Okay, okay. I suppose I could be wrong… Maybe I wasn’t looking, and just presumed.
Hey! I just realized! I happen to have my old and new cards in my pocket right now! Let’s see what they say…
:smack: DAMN!!! :smack: The first one expired 05/07, the second one will expire 05/09, and they both have the same number!!!
My sincerest apologies to everyone who got confused by my mistaken posts.
Having the new card use the same number as the expired one is not good. A lot of merchants’ systems are not set up to deal with this sort of thing. I had problems with Amazon, Paypal and Yahoo in November when I got my new Visa debit, which for the first time had the same account number rather than a new one.
Although I was able to get Amazon and Paypal to eventually accept my new expiration date, I spent about 8 hours total on the phone with Yahoo over a period of ten days to get them to accept the card and restore my website which their system couldn’t accept payment for. Having a website disappear because they can’t accept payment because “this account number is already on file” (which is what Amazon and Paypal’s systems said too) is very frustrating.
It’s completely routine that they have the same number. I’ve only been using credit cards since 1988 or so, and every time they expire, they always have the same credit card number. I would be surprised if my credit card number ever changed.
I would find more competent merchants to buy from, then.
Because, as Balthisar said, this is completely the normal practice.
If it’s the same card from the same issuer with the same number, why waste time notifying merchants anyway? When you buy something, the charge will go through (that’s what the OP was about). And until you buy something, why do you care?
I’ve never had a credit card account number change when I got a new card, and I’ve got some accounts that are decades old. I have, however, had to update the expiration dates on several merchant accounts that I have set up for automatic payments.