How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

Does a credit card company consider where the computer or the I.P.
address is when deciding if one has made an international charge?

I recently made a US to Europe airline reservation online and the
payment didn't go through, twice, even though I had put in the cc
information, etc. At least the screen never returned.

Not wanting to lose the reservation I quickly called the airline on the
phone and the man took my name and flight number and handled it.

When I got off the phone, I had 8 email alerts from my credit-card
company, in 3 batches.

At 12:54AM, for the full price of the ticket there was a transaction
alert and an online/phone alert (for the same transaction).
At 1:03AM, there was a charge for $1 that generated an online/phone
alert and an international alert.
At 1:10AM, there was a charge for the full price of the ticket plus $8
that generated a transaction alert, an online/phone alert, and an
international alert. (Plus a low credit balance alert)

Can I conclude that the first charge resulted from my being on the
computer (even though the screen never returned) in the USA, and that's
why there was no international alert?

But the third charge was the result of the person I called on the phone
using a computer in Europe, so my cc company looked at it as an
internatinoal charge?

If not, what?


P.S. After a few days one of the two charges for the ticket disappeared,
and maybe the dollar charge also. (I only get email alerts for charges,
not reversals. Not realizing this has caused me embarrassment once, when
I nagged someone to give me back my money, even though he already had.
For some reason I thought an email would have come, but they come only
for charges.)

On 03 Jan 2019, micky wrote in
alt.comp.os.windows-10:

Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

There could hardly be a worse one.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

micky wrote in
news

Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

Does a credit card company consider where the computer or the I.P.
address is when deciding if one has made an international charge?

For a company anywhere to successfully charge a transaction they have to
be registered with that credit card company. That would include the
location of the entity billing the transaction and/or the headquarters of
that company.
As an example, if I here in the US want to reserve a seat on an El Al
(Israeli) flight, my credit card company here will know that this is a
foreign transaction (unless EL AL has a reservation site here in the US),
and apply any rules and/or restrictions they may have or that you may
have set. This would also include any currency exchange needed if El AL
was not set up to bill in US Dollars.

I had the reverse happen a month or so ago. I got an email from my credit
card company that someone had tried to charge my card from Wales, Great
Britain, at 4:30 am their time. Since it was originating from somewhere
else than my home area, they denied it and alerted me via email. If I had
actually been the one making the charge in Wales, when they denied the
charge I would have contacted them and verified that it was me, at which
time they would accept the transaction, and note that I was currently
away from home in that location. So, if you are traveling, it wouldn't
hurt to let your CC company know that you plan to be in a certain
location for such and such a time, so they will know it is not a
fraudulent transaction. They may contact the vendor to make sure that it
is you and not someone using a stolen card or CC number.

In article , micky
wrote:

Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

not newsgroups, but there are several web forums *just* for discussions
about credit cards and how to optimize their use.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

if the business location of the merchant is in a different country than
the cardholder's billing address.

note that some companies operate in more than one country, so it may
not always be obvious where their business location actually is for
transactions.

Does a credit card company consider where the computer or the I.P.
address is when deciding if one has made an international charge?

no, although your location when the purchase is made is one factor used
to determine fraud.

In article , Wolf K
wrote:

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

The card number.

no.

micky wrote:
Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

It would depend on who the retailer uses as their "cc processor".

A "cc processor" is located nominally in some country.

If that country doesn't match your country, the transaction is
international.

You would expect the country a business is in, to match the
country of the "cc processor", but that might not be the
case.

If you were an e-tailer, you might view web pages like
this, to find a "cc processor" for your operation.

https://www.payfirma.com/engage/cana...nt-processors/

If the US government finds some operation which is "just outside
its legal reach", it sometimes leans on "cc processors" such that
the operation can't get anyone to process credit cards for them.
This is a means of "cutting off the oxygen supply" of the operation.
So while it may appear to be "just business", it isn't always
"business as usual".

https://instabill.com/ecommerce-indu...hant-accounts/

The main benefit of cc, is dispute resolution. Other payment
options are available, but tend to be unidirectional (like
when you sent that MoneyPak to the Nigerian Prince). Unless you
can find a way of doing this...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escrow

Paul

In article , Paul
wrote:

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

It would depend on who the retailer uses as their "cc processor".

no, it depends where the retailer is based, not who processes it.



The main benefit of cc, is dispute resolution.

that's one benefit of many.

the main benefit for nearly everyone is floating the money, up to
roughly two months. another benefit are the rewards and bonuses
offered, resulting in free travel and other perks.

In alt.comp.os.windows-10, on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 19:08:07 GMT, Tim
wrote:

micky wrote in
news

Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

I should have said that the airline is not based in the US.


Does a credit card company consider where the computer or the I.P.
address is when deciding if one has made an international charge?

For a company anywhere to successfully charge a transaction they have to
be registered with that credit card company. That would include the
location of the entity billing the transaction and/or the headquarters of
that company.
As an example, if I here in the US want to reserve a seat on an El Al
(Israeli) flight, my credit card company here will know that this is a
foreign transaction (unless EL AL has a reservation site here in the US),
and apply any rules and/or restrictions they may have or that you may
have set. This would also include any currency exchange needed if El AL
was not set up to bill in US Dollars.

I appreciate all the (speedy) answers, but no one directly addressed the
strange contrast, that email alerts in the first batch did NOT include
an internatinal-charge alert, and alerts in the 2nd and 3rd batch DID
include that.


Doesnt' that imply that the airline "has a reservation site here in the
US" that got used the first time when I was on the computer, but didn't
get used when I was on the phone????

And another question would be, doesn't all this imply that the reason
for double billing was the attempt to pay online, which was more
successful than it looked to me, followed by payment on the phone? And
that the phone computer didn't know until a few days had passed about
the online computer payment? -- That's what started this, someone in
another forum who claims that this airline has for years always billed
twice for tickets. (Which would be pretty strange, and even though I
bought from them two years ago and was only billed once.)


And Wolf, the credit card number was the same.

I think the business location of the airline also stayed the same during
those 20 minutes.

I had the reverse happen a month or so ago. I got an email from my credit
card company that someone had tried to charge my card from Wales, Great
Britain, at 4:30 am their time. Since it was originating from somewhere
else than my home area, they denied it and alerted me via email. If I had
actually been the one making the charge in Wales, when they denied the
charge I would have contacted them and verified that it was me, at which
time they would accept the transaction, and note that I was currently
away from home in that location. So, if you are traveling, it wouldn't
hurt to let your CC company know that you plan to be in a certain
location for such and such a time, so they will know it is not a
fraudulent transaction. They may contact the vendor to make sure that it
is you and not someone using a stolen card or CC number.

In article , micky
wrote:


I should have said that the airline is not based in the US.

that much was obvious.




I think the business location of the airline also stayed the same during
those 20 minutes.

online transactions with a company that does business worldwide could
be processed from a different location than via a phone agent.

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 18:09:37 -0500, micky
wrote:


And another question would be, doesn't all this imply that the reason
for double billing was the attempt to pay online, which was more
successful than it looked to me, followed by payment on the phone? And
that the phone computer didn't know until a few days had passed about
the online computer payment?

Credit card charges often come in two parts. The first part is a
pre-authorization (If I were to make this charge, would it be
approved?). This is very common at gas stations and restaurants and
shows as "pending" if you look at your account online. The second
part is the real charge. In your example, the first part went
through, but due to some problem, the final didn't. After a few days,
the pending charge is dropped if the real charge is never received.
That had nothing to due with your phone transaction.

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 19:08:07 GMT, Tim wrote:

I had the reverse happen a month or so ago. I got an email from my credit
card company that someone had tried to charge my card from Wales, Great
Britain, at 4:30 am their time. Since it was originating from somewhere
else than my home area, they denied it and alerted me via email. If I had
actually been the one making the charge in Wales, when they denied the
charge I would have contacted them and verified that it was me, at which
time they would accept the transaction, and note that I was currently
away from home in that location.

So, if you are traveling, it wouldn't
hurt to let your CC company know that you plan to be in a certain
location for such and such a time, so they will know it is not a
fraudulent transaction. They may contact the vendor to make sure that it
is you and not someone using a stolen card or CC number.

The following may not be universal advice, but each of my CC companies
has told me the same thing: There's no need to set travel alerts anymore
since they know when and where I'm traveling.

In my case, since I travel almost every week for work, they see (and
apparently share amongst themselves) the fact that I've booked an
airline ticket from point A to point B on certain dates, plus they see
that I've booked a hotel room in point B for those dates, and in most
cases I've booked a rental car for those dates.

If you just hop in a car and start driving, you probably need gas or
food eventually, so they can see where you are that way. That's probably
only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to data collection.

On Fri, 04 Jan 2019 09:31:00 -0600, Char Jackson
wrote:

On Thu, 03 Jan 2019 19:08:07 GMT, Tim wrote:

I had the reverse happen a month or so ago. I got an email from my credit
card company that someone had tried to charge my card from Wales, Great
Britain, at 4:30 am their time. Since it was originating from somewhere
else than my home area, they denied it and alerted me via email. If I had
actually been the one making the charge in Wales, when they denied the
charge I would have contacted them and verified that it was me, at which
time they would accept the transaction, and note that I was currently
away from home in that location.

So, if you are traveling, it wouldn't
hurt to let your CC company know that you plan to be in a certain
location for such and such a time, so they will know it is not a
fraudulent transaction. They may contact the vendor to make sure that it
is you and not someone using a stolen card or CC number.

The following may not be universal advice, but each of my CC companies
has told me the same thing: There's no need to set travel alerts anymore
since they know when and where I'm traveling.


I can't remember which are which, but I've heard the same thing from
some CC companies, and others have thanked me for letting them know. I
don't try to remember but always call them all before I go, just to
be on the safe side.

micky wrote:
In alt.comp.os.windows-10, on Thu, 03 Jan 2019 19:08:07 GMT, Tim
wrote:

micky wrote in
news
Is there a better newgroup for this? At any rate, I think it's
interesting.

How does a cc company know if a charge is international?

I should have said that the airline is not based in the US.

Does a credit card company consider where the computer or the I.P.
address is when deciding if one has made an international charge?

For a company anywhere to successfully charge a transaction they have to
be registered with that credit card company. That would include the
location of the entity billing the transaction and/or the headquarters of
that company.
As an example, if I here in the US want to reserve a seat on an El Al
(Israeli) flight, my credit card company here will know that this is a
foreign transaction (unless EL AL has a reservation site here in the US),
and apply any rules and/or restrictions they may have or that you may
have set. This would also include any currency exchange needed if El AL
was not set up to bill in US Dollars.

I appreciate all the (speedy) answers, but no one directly addressed the
strange contrast, that email alerts in the first batch did NOT include
an internatinal-charge alert, and alerts in the 2nd and 3rd batch DID
include that.

Doesnt' that imply that the airline "has a reservation site here in the
US" that got used the first time when I was on the computer, but didn't
get used when I was on the phone????

(AFAICT,) You didn't say whether 'your' airline "has a reservation
site here in the US" - i.e. what was the domain of the website at the
instant of your booking -, nor what number you called - i.e. US or
abroad -, so there's no way to tell.

FWIW, for our credit cards, the reports *do* mention the country of
the transaction. For example when I booked our Singapore Airline tickets
from our home in The Netherlands, the credit card report listed 'NLD'
(The Netherlands) as the country (and the payment in the local currency
(Euros)).

Another (hotel) booking, says 'VIC' (Victoria, Australia) and 'AUD'
(Australian Dollars).

So for me there's never any doubt where Tim "the entity billing the
transaction" /Tim is located.

[...]

In article , Wolf K
wrote:

Your card number is linked to a pile of metadata, including your
location and that of the card issuer.

what you're calling 'location' is known as the 'cardholder billing
address'.

the card number does indicate who the card issuer is (bin#), but not
where they are based, and that card number itself can change for a
variety of reasons, including bin.

and then there are virtual numbers and mobile wallets, where there are
multiple card numbers all referencing the same account (normally using
a different bin, and sometimes a completely different issuer). in some
cases, they do not include the cardholder's name and/or billing
address, one of many reasons why they're more secure.

The vendor is party to the
transaction, as is any agency that receives payment on behalf of the
vendor. If one or more borders intervene between the parties, the
transaction is "international".

*that* is what matters, not the number.

That's why your cc number is the key.

it isn't.

In article , Wolf K
wrote:

Your card number is linked to a pile of metadata, including your
location and that of the card issuer.

what you're calling 'location' is known as the 'cardholder billing
address'.

Aw gee, sorry for not making that explicit. I'm sure I confused a
massive number of readers.

you quite likely did, given that you don't understand it yourself.

the card number does indicate who the card issuer is (bin#), but not
where they are based, and that card number itself can change for a
variety of reasons, including bin.

Are you claiming that the issuer is based nowhere?

nope.

i'm claiming the card issuer can have more than one location, the
opposite of nowhere.

american express, for example, issues cards in many different countries.

and then there are virtual numbers and mobile wallets, where there are
multiple card numbers all referencing the same account (normally using
a different bin, and sometimes a completely different issuer). in some
cases, they do not include the cardholder's name and/or billing
address, one of many reasons why they're more secure.

And yet, somehow, the money is transferred from the buyer to the seller.
Without any link between card number and any other part of the
transaction. Must be magic.

completely missing the point.

i didn't say no link.

i said that there can be multiple card numbers referencing a single
account (call it linked to, if you prefer), the opposite of no link.

The vendor is party to the
transaction, as is any agency that receives payment on behalf of the
vendor. If one or more borders intervene between the parties, the
transaction is "international".

*that* is what matters, not the number.

So my cc's number has role in determining whether there's a border
between me and any other party to the transaction? You know, you're
coming close to claiming that the card number doesn't matter at all.

not only close to it, but i've said that a few times already.

what matters is the billing address of the cardholder and where the
merchant is based (which can vary).

it's what you call 'one or more borders intervene between the parties',
something which makes no sense for online transactions and even many
physical ones.

some merchants do business in more than one country, so where they are
based may not always be obvious.

airlines is an example already given.

it also does not matter unless the card adds an additional foreign
transaction fee. the solution there is to use a card that does not.

it's possible an international purchase might generate a fraud alert,
but if it's a legitimate purchase, that's easily confirmed and it
should go through.

That's why your cc number is the key.

it isn't.

Are you saying that my cc's number has no connection me whatsoever? Nor
to the transaction that begins with that number?

no.

once again, you're saying the opposite.