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That's interesting, because last year I called up Visa to tell them I was going to Europe, and they told me they don't need to be notified of that anymore, and

That's interesting, because last year I called up Visa to tell them I was going to Europe, and they told me they don't need to be notified of that anymore, and my card would work fine. Perhaps different CC providers have different policies, or maybe this is some Apple thing?

Marsymars 7y ago
Yes, the trend is to not requiring notification, but different CC providers do have different policies.
frutiger 7y ago
I had this a few years back, but their explanation made a lot of sense: "even if you tell us, we're going to apply exactly the same fraud detection algorithms anyway."
lowercased 7y ago
10 years ago I traveled to china. 8 and 6 years ago I traveled to russia. In all cases, I used my standard credit card for most stuff. No issues at all, and I didn't tell the bank beforehand. 5 years ago - months after the last russia trip, I used the same card to buy a small service from a company in sweden. I'd bought multiple times before - same service, same company for many years - and this was... $9? Transaction flagged - entire account frozen, without warning or notification (no call or email or text) - marked as 'fraudulent activity'. Without telling me what was going on, several auto payments were declined over the next few days, and it took hours to sort everything out. Absolutely no rhyme nor reason I can see as to how 'fraud detection' is done.
- wtmt 7y ago
  Security policies must be changing all the time due to changes in fraud patterns. The $9 transaction getting flagged in a different country isn’t a surprise anymore since banks figure out that fraudsters “test” credit card numbers with small transactions and then sell that to others (for more fraud) or use for larger fraudulent transactions. This doesn’t explain why the same transactions from the past weren’t taken into account, but must be related to this fraud pattern having a higher weight in flagging transactions.
cageface 7y ago
I've been traveling all over Asia for most of the last ten years. At least a few times a year one of my cards gets flagged by some algorithm. I can resolve this almost instantly with my Capitol One card via an SMS or the app. Or I can call my back to have my debit cards unblocked in max 10 minutes. My Apple card has been blocked for almost a week now and all I'm getting is automated responses.

Marsymars 7y ago

Yes, the trend is to not requiring notification, but different CC providers do have different policies.

frutiger 7y ago

I had this a few years back, but their explanation made a lot of sense: "even if you tell us, we're going to apply exactly the same fraud detection algorithms anyway."

lowercased 7y ago

10 years ago I traveled to china. 8 and 6 years ago I traveled to russia. In all cases, I used my standard credit card for most stuff. No issues at all, and I didn't tell the bank beforehand. 5 years ago - months after the last russia trip, I used the same card to buy a small service from a company in sweden. I'd bought multiple times before - same service, same company for many years - and this was... $9? Transaction flagged - entire account frozen, without warning or notification (no call or email or text) - marked as 'fraudulent activity'. Without telling me what was going on, several auto payments were declined over the next few days, and it took hours to sort everything out. Absolutely no rhyme nor reason I can see as to how 'fraud detection' is done.

wtmt 7y ago
Security policies must be changing all the time due to changes in fraud patterns. The $9 transaction getting flagged in a different country isn’t a surprise anymore since banks figure out that fraudsters “test” credit card numbers with small transactions and then sell that to others (for more fraud) or use for larger fraudulent transactions. This doesn’t explain why the same transactions from the past weren’t taken into account, but must be related to this fraud pattern having a higher weight in flagging transactions.

cageface 7y ago

I've been traveling all over Asia for most of the last ten years. At least a few times a year one of my cards gets flagged by some algorithm. I can resolve this almost instantly with my Capitol One card via an SMS or the app. Or I can call my back to have my debit cards unblocked in max 10 minutes. My Apple card has been blocked for almost a week now and all I'm getting is automated responses.