online creidt cards

December 1, 2005 8:58 AM

Is there a credit card product for shopping online?

I use a card and keep the credit limit at the lowest allowed to be safe. I wonder if there is something like one number per purchase cards that would be even safer?

posted by larry_darrell to Work & Money (9 answers total)

My citibank credit card will let me make a virtual account number to help protect against fraud. In their words: "generate a random credit card number and make it virtually impossible for anyone to steal your actual account number while shopping online."
posted by exogenous at 9:04 AM on December 1, 2005

Maybe look into a disposable credit card?
posted by banished at 9:05 AM on December 1, 2005

what exogenous said. get a citi card (dividend platinum select gives 5% cash back on grocery/drug/gas purchases and 1% on everything else) and you can make as many virtual numbers as you like. you can set time and cash limits on each number, and activate/delete them as you wish.
posted by rxrfrx at 9:27 AM on December 1, 2005

MBNA offers single-use numbers on their credit cards as well. More here.
posted by SteveInMaine at 9:37 AM on December 1, 2005

I use the same citibank Virtual Account Number deal that exogenous does. You can launch it from the web or download a desktop tool for it too. Most convenient, assuming you have or can qualify for a citibank card.
posted by FlamingBore at 10:37 AM on December 1, 2005

Discover has a similar product, wherein a little desktop app on your local machine generates a new account number each time.

Be warned though, in my limited experience with their program, if the merchant is going to split your order due to backlog/etc, and tries to make a seperate charge for each shipment, it will fail.
posted by nomisxid at 10:45 AM on December 1, 2005

I'm curious as to how refunds are handled for these "virtual numbers". Does the merchant system know that it's a temporary number, and send the money back to the main account? Wouldn't that defeat the purpose of the temporary number?

I also see this on the Citi site:

Note: Virtual Account Numbers cannot be used for purchases that require you to show your credit card at time of pick-up (e.g., movie tickets, etc.), because the account numbers will not match.

This is why I like using PayPal whenever possible. I will buy a more expensive item from an online retailer that accepts PayPal, just for the protection they provide. It's one more layer between a hacker and my credit card or bank account.

As for having to show a card to pick something up; the movie thing would bother me, but I rarely go to movie theatres anymore. And if I were picking up something at will call, and they wanted to see my credit card, but NOT my ID (as has been the case for me in the past)? I'd be worried.

I like the idea of virtual card numbers. I just think they need to work out some of the kinks.
posted by weirdoactor at 12:28 PM on December 1, 2005

I just make sure I use a different card for my online purchases. Because it's no big deal if your card gets ripped off online, except that you have to change any recurring billing that uses it. You just call in and say there is a charge you don't recognize and they cancel the card.
posted by smackfu at 1:01 PM on December 1, 2005

There's an interesting new product that's popped up here in Ireland, called 3v - basically a pre-paid credit card designed almost exclusively for online shopping. I've been waiting for something like this for ages, because I hate using my credit card for online shopping (because I never pay the money back to the card, like I promise myself I will) :)
posted by antifuse at 3:37 AM on December 2, 2005