Fraud prevention causing headache

General Chat
1

I ordered a piece of furniture online over the weekend, used a credit card for the £200, all went through fine. Got an email today stating that a refund has been issued as it looks like a fraudulent purchase. Phoned them to be told that they won’t sell to me because their system is saying fraud and there’s nothing they can do, I’ll have to find another company to buy from.

Does anyone have experience with issues like this?
What could trigger a fraud alert like this?
Could get really difficult if more companies arbitrarily decide that I’m a fraud risk for some reason.

Any help is much appreciated :blush:

2

Call your credit card provider, fraud team, and ask them to remove the block, then repurchase.

3

I’d contact your bank to be honest, they can tell you why it was flagged.

Someone may have attempted to use your details in the past which may flag.

Though, as it’s not finance and you can provide the money I don’t know why they would refuse to deal?

4

For card non present (like online) transactions the merchant is liable for fraudulent purchases so if the transaction does end up being fraudulent they’re essentially out of pocket, so that’s why they refuse transactions that look too fishy.

5

Thanks guys, will try the Bank although according to the retailer it’s internal systems not credit card that flagged it :man_shrugging:t3:

I’ll see what the bank says…

6

That seems very odd, if I might ask was it a normal-ish transaction? i.e. same card and delivery address etc.

The only time this ever happened to me was when I tried to use a fairly inactive card to buy an item and for various reasons (primarily retailer related) the transactions kept failing so the multiple attempts looked sketchy to Lloyds so they froze my card for a bit until I rang them.

@zombi I think he’s suggesting the retailer is rejecting his payment instead of the card provider.

I’d keep pushing it and asking for an itemised list of why it was identified as fraudulent and whether something like providing additional info would help.

MW

7

if theyre a larger company you can make a complaint to obtain the data and stuff

8

Thanks, I thought it was odd too.
Nothing unusual when purchasing, same address and went through first time. The money even left my credit card, waiting on a refund now so the card issuer approved the transaction.

I don’t use the CC very often, only for the odd large purchase but have never had a problem.

1 Like
9

The retailer has no way of knowing how much you use the card though, if the bank authorised the payment then I can’t see how that is an issue, realistically the retailer only really has the following information about you:

  • Name

  • Contact Details

  • IP Address

  • Payment Information including address

  • Delivery information

  • Purchase history with them

So there are only a limited number of things they can be working with, you’ve said the payment and delivery address were the same so that could be ruled out, and I’m assuming if you arent being sold to this time that you haven’t purchased with them in the past.

Removing the obvious options I’d come to the conclusion that either your name, IP address or area where you live has been identified with an increase in fraudulent activity, all of which are not at all unique to you so I can’t see any justification for blocking an order.

The cynic in me suspects that they either don’t have the product in stock or don’t want to deliver it to you because of some logistical difficulty and so are fobbing you off with excuses :frowning:

8 Likes
10

:+1::+1: I think you may have solved it!!!

It’s possible/probable I was connected through a VPN, didn’t even consider this.
May well have been the IP Address that’s flagged.

Thanks for that, I’ll have to remember this.

1 Like
11

I have had that happen to me once on ebuyer. They wanted to see a copy of my council tax bill before they would process the order because of fraud prevention. They said it was because of the area I lived in (SE18). I said “No thanks” and ordered elsewhere.

1 Like
12

I live in SE18 never
Had that happen to me. Glad you refused

13

Methodical, clear, well thought of and knowledgeable. If all posts in Internet were more like this, it would be a much better place. :clap:

1 Like
14

Some merchant processors, such as WorldPay, have a method of fraud scoring all transactions processed through them.

With WorldPay in particular, the transaction will appear to be successfully processed, but the merchant will get a message telling them to check the transaction in their portal. If the merchant is happy with the data given by WorldPay, they can select to approve the transaction, or decline it.

I use WorldPay as my processor, and this happens on a regular basis!

3 Likes
15

There are also 3rd parties that companies (specifically those that are a target for fraud - high value, high resale) will send data off to (in addition to the processor).

If you were connected through a VPN then the fraud scoring system would be correct to reject your order ( a risk with vpns is that fraudsters regularly use them)