4 ms·

One thing I try to do to avoid this is to always make a purchase at the airport before I go overseas. This seems to calm down the algos a bit. I used to go thro

One thing I try to do to avoid this is to always make a purchase at the airport before I go overseas. This seems to calm down the algos a bit. I used to go through this a bunch too.

0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago
I do the same, and again when I land. Try to double down on signaling to the black box.
- m_fayer 3y ago
  That is a great idea and as another frequent traveler I’ll take this to heart. While shaking my head and muttering to myself that I guess this is where we are now.
sentientslug 3y ago
Great idea, spend your money to earn the privilege of spending your money later.
- kevstev 3y ago
  I hear you- but buying a coffee or magazine I wanted anyway isn't such a big price to pay to help ensure I'm not in an annoying situation where my card is declined somewhere and I have to call internationally to get it sorted.
mickelsen 3y ago
One day my card got cloned and I see some withdrawals from a foreign country. I promptly report it, transactions reversed and the bank issued a new card. After this, I was getting fraud alerts and either informative or confirmation SMS when that was triggered in the past. It seemed to follow whenever a transaction passed $100, then $500, then $1000 and a certain frequency or off-hours. It's like the risk threshold got a reset with the new issued plastic. Eventually the algorithm was trained I suppose, back it was back to where it was, and stopped getting alerts for anything out of the usual. This resonates with the experience of friends in the same bank, who hardly ever use their credit cards, so whatever they buy gets flagged and someone calls to make sure it's them. Old fashioned banks who are behind the times in technology, but keep richer clients, are usually less annoying, both with the fraud algos thing and also the KYC stuff, and sometimes the difference is massive.
teddyh 3y ago
“It approves of rereading.”

One thing I try to do to avoid this is to always make a purchase at the airport before I go overseas. This seems to calm down the algos a bit. I used to go through this a bunch too.

0cf8612b2e1e 3y ago

I do the same, and again when I land. Try to double down on signaling to the black box.

m_fayer 3y ago
That is a great idea and as another frequent traveler I’ll take this to heart. While shaking my head and muttering to myself that I guess this is where we are now.

sentientslug 3y ago

Great idea, spend your money to earn the privilege of spending your money later.

kevstev 3y ago
I hear you- but buying a coffee or magazine I wanted anyway isn't such a big price to pay to help ensure I'm not in an annoying situation where my card is declined somewhere and I have to call internationally to get it sorted.

mickelsen 3y ago

One day my card got cloned and I see some withdrawals from a foreign country. I promptly report it, transactions reversed and the bank issued a new card. After this, I was getting fraud alerts and either informative or confirmation SMS when that was triggered in the past. It seemed to follow whenever a transaction passed $100, then $500, then $1000 and a certain frequency or off-hours. It's like the risk threshold got a reset with the new issued plastic. Eventually the algorithm was trained I suppose, back it was back to where it was, and stopped getting alerts for anything out of the usual. This resonates with the experience of friends in the same bank, who hardly ever use their credit cards, so whatever they buy gets flagged and someone calls to make sure it's them. Old fashioned banks who are behind the times in technology, but keep richer clients, are usually less annoying, both with the fraud algos thing and also the KYC stuff, and sometimes the difference is massive.

teddyh 3y ago

“It approves of rereading.”