Your Credit Card Is Spying on You

[MarketNeutral]

Visa knows if you’re going to get a divorce. It knows that you just moved and, most importantly, it knows if you’re going to miss a payment—maybe before you do.

Credit card companies have developed eerily accurate models for predicting consumer behavior based on the things they buy, the Daily Beast explains. “Card companies don’t really care about divorce in and of itself—they care whether you’re going to pay your card off,” explains one law professor.

People who buy cheap motor oil or drink in certain bars are considered risky borrowers, whereas people who buy carbon monoxide detectors and premium birdseed tend to pay on time.

When American Express offered some customers $300 to close their accounts last year, it used this kind of data to pick its targets. And if the company predicts a major life change, like a move or divorce, it alerts marketing partners, so they can sell you things like furniture and home refurbishing services.

http://www.newser.com/story/85372/your-credit-card-is-spying-on-you.html

[Ponce]

Credit card companies are now nothing more that "predators....." because I only use my CC on line (same companies all the time, preps) there is not much that they can learn from me.

[Ares]

What about people who don't use credit cards?? Ohh yeah they can't be "tracked".

Credit Card clean since 2006 :)

[big country]

What about people who don't use credit cards?? Ohh yeah they can't be "tracked".

Credit Card clean since 2006 :)


Does that include debit card / bank card?

[Ponce]

Ares? tell me your secret.........how do you order on line, rent a car, rent a room, buy an airline ticket.........and so on?, it would be nice to know.

[Ares]

They're called Visa gift cards, can be picked up anywhere. Not linked to a name, just a number.

I have an ATM/DEBIT card, but very rarely gets used anymore. I use something called CASH. :)

My job pays for the Hotel/Airline fee, they also pay for the car, and I use the visa gift card to purchase items online. Or paypal, more places are using that now too.

[ximmy]

I try to pay cash for everything... unless I absolutely positively have to have it now

[Ponce]

Well, I don't work for anyone and I am retired.........you probably have to "prepay" for those cards and I don't know how safe my money with them would be in the future.

Besides.......it would be kind of hard to give them $5,000 in cash for airlines tickets, like I used a while ago.......you give them that much in cash and they will turn you in to uncle sugar.

[Ares]

Well, I don't work for anyone and I am retired.........you probably have to "prepay" for those cards and I don't know how safe my money with them would be in the future.

Besides.......it would be kind of hard to give them $5,000 in cash for airlines tickets, like I used a while ago.......you give them that much in cash and they will turn you in to uncle sugar.


I've seen quite a few people pay for airline tickets in cash at the counter. Yeah you don't get the convenience of the self check in, but the people I saw doing it were retiree's.

[cigarlover]

Well, I don't work for anyone and I am retired.........you probably have to "prepay" for those cards and I don't know how safe my money with them would be in the future.

Besides.......it would be kind of hard to give them $5,000 in cash for airlines tickets, like I used a while ago.......you give them that much in cash and they will turn you in to uncle sugar.


You can also pay cash at a travel agent for your tickets. Can probably book and pay for a hotel with them as well.

[striped_bear]

They're called Visa gift cards, can be picked up anywhere. Not linked to a name, just a number.

I have an ATM/DEBIT card, but very rarely gets used anymore. I use something called CASH. :)

My job pays for the Hotel/Airline fee, they also pay for the car, and I use the visa gift card to purchase items online. Or paypal, more places are using that now too.


Unless you're using a credit card with PayPal, you must have it set up with your bank account.

That's of course just as "tracked" as a credit card, and linking PayPal to your main bank account is foolish imho. More foolish than using a credit card.

I have PayPal set up with a bank account as well, but it's an empty one at a bank that I don't use anymore (free checking account). If I ever deposit funds into it from PayPal I drain the account the same day (too many horror stories online about PayPal randomly draining people's checking accounts).

[Ares]

They're called Visa gift cards, can be picked up anywhere. Not linked to a name, just a number.

I have an ATM/DEBIT card, but very rarely gets used anymore. I use something called CASH. :)

My job pays for the Hotel/Airline fee, they also pay for the car, and I use the visa gift card to purchase items online. Or paypal, more places are using that now too.


Unless you're using a credit card with PayPal, you must have it set up with your bank account.

That's of course just as "tracked" as a credit card, and linking PayPal to your main bank account is foolish imho. More foolish than using a credit card.

I have PayPal set up with a bank account as well, but it's an empty one at a bank that I don't use anymore (free checking account). If I ever deposit funds into it from PayPal I drain the account the same day (too many horror stories online about PayPal randomly draining people's checking accounts).


Gotta give me a little more credit than that. I have my paypal acount going to a a bank account that has just enough in it to keep it open. :)

[striped_bear]

They're called Visa gift cards, can be picked up anywhere. Not linked to a name, just a number.

I have an ATM/DEBIT card, but very rarely gets used anymore. I use something called CASH. :)

My job pays for the Hotel/Airline fee, they also pay for the car, and I use the visa gift card to purchase items online. Or paypal, more places are using that now too.


Unless you're using a credit card with PayPal, you must have it set up with your bank account.

That's of course just as "tracked" as a credit card, and linking PayPal to your main bank account is foolish imho. More foolish than using a credit card.

I have PayPal set up with a bank account as well, but it's an empty one at a bank that I don't use anymore (free checking account). If I ever deposit funds into it from PayPal I drain the account the same day (too many horror stories online about PayPal randomly draining people's checking accounts).


Gotta give me a little more credit than that. I have my paypal acount going to a a bank account that has just enough in it to keep it open. :)


*striped_bear nods slowly while giving you a knowing look*

[techguy]

So your credit card is like santa claus....

It knows when you've been sleeping
It knows when you're awake.
It knows when you've been bad or good,
So be good for goodness sake!

[beefsteak]

Unless you're using a credit card with PayPal, you must have it set up with your bank account.

That's of course just as "tracked" as a credit card, and linking PayPal to your main bank account is foolish imho. More foolish than using a credit card.

I have PayPal set up with a bank account as well, but it's an empty one at a bank that I don't use anymore (free checking account). If I ever deposit funds into it from PayPal I drain the account the same day (too many horror stories online about PayPal randomly draining people's checking accounts).


Striped_bear,
that is an excellent practice. Shows me you think outside the PayPal box! ;D

I have implemented an even further protective strategy specifically because of PayPal, before identity theft ever became a normal topic of conversation!!

I suggest you and others: Ask the BRANCH MANAGER for and receive a follow-up written confirmation of the following customer initiated request: Code your account to absolutely prohibit any overdraws. PayPal tried that on me not once but twice. The bank manager sent it back, not as NSF, but as REFUSED BY THE BANK. That's a huge difference. And I incurred no fees since I had a coded account.

The back story?

I had proof of delivery via Delivery Confirmation of a sale of over $300 total. On the 30th day after the eBay sale, the buyer (who never, ever contacted me, nor returned any merchandise for refund or exchange) initiated a complaint against me as the seller through PayPal.

PayPal resolved it in their favor. P/P informed me in writing that because I hadn't had used a "SIG REQUIRED - Del Conf. " (yes, the hot pink one), that I couldn't prove delivery. I got to my bank account before they did, and instituted the change in coding. PayPal has eaten their foolish decision, and I've still got the money the buyer paid me.

What saved me was that coding change I initiated. I went to the bank, told them what happened, and they cheerfully refused the chargeback, not once but twice. I've never heard about that since.

I was surprised to learn something else as the result of that interaction: as a rule, Banks and Bankers do NOT hold PayPal in high regard at all. Disdain and disgust would be better descriptors.

beef

[striped_bear]

I just tried setting that up with my bank and they refused... lame.

[1970 Silver Art]

My advice: DO NOT......I repeat....DO NOT get a credit card. This "Credit card spying on you" issue is just another reason to not get a credit card.

Credit cards are the Financial "Meth" that will ultimately destroy a person's "financial health".

[beefsteak]

I just tried setting that up with my bank and they refused... lame.


Striped_bear,
I'm sorry to hear that. I'd go over that branch managers head. They all have supervisiors. I suspect the Branch Manager simply doesn't know where to look in the computer in order to put your request into action.

When verbal fails, then put it in writing, have it notarized and deliver your request to the supervisor of the branch manager level.

They truly do not want to. It is simply too juicy of a fee generator.

Persistance, good man. Persistance.

I know it can be done, because I've done it. To 3 accounts, and have it in written that my request was implemented, on their letterhead.

beefsteak