codemonkey
Shared on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:35A bit about credit card fraud... no, our website has not gone live yet, and we've got a few credit card fraud prevention techniques. However, it still impacts us in many major ways without being the target of the fraud.
Why is our e-commerce site still holding out? Why aren't we live? Well, the site isn't 100% done yet, but that's not the show stopper. It is buying products! That should be easy right?
No sir, it's not that easy.
Case 1: Buying 10 xbox 360's (with PGR3 included)
We put in an order with the distributor to purchase a bunch of 360's at a fairly good deal. Yet, the order doens't go through. Why? We have to call them and talk to them in person and explain who we are and what we do. They then update our profile so we can purchase - the product first goes through.
Why: The site has been targeted for fraud many times. You must buy a 10-pack of Xbox 360's and you can make fairly good profit margins on them. The site doesn't require a tax-id (anyone can buy) so stolen credit cards are used to buy as many xbox 360's as possible. Those, now "stolen" 360's are sold for profit and the company gets screwed because it was an illegal credit card.
Annoyance Level: Mild. We don't mind having to provide an extra step to get the product if it is quick and easy.
Case 2: Buying large game inventory from distributor
The next distributor has great deals on games. However, before we can work with them we must fax them our "papers" that say we're a registered company in NH (and we don't have taxes). No big deal right? Next, we find we CANNOT use a c.o.d. to buy the inventory. The first transmission must be a wire, money order, or check in the mail. They still don't trust us, regardless of paperwork. Our second sale can be done with c.o.d - not the first
Why: Fraud. They're probably getting screwed by single "large" sales with spoofed paperwork.
Annoyance Level: High. We have to wire them funds, which costs us more money. That lost money cuts into our profit margins. It also requires us to take out money at the bank and bring it to Wal-Mart to wire for half the price of a bank (to save us some money). If we use check or money order the round trip time on our transaction is measured in weeks - not hours. We don't have weeks to wait.
Case 3: Bank shuts off card.
Bank of America shut off our credit card doing our third transaction with another distributor. Why? Because we ordered 10 xbox 360's a few days prior and then performed another large order, and here comes another? The bank was afraid our card was stolen and disabled it.
Why: Fraud! Dammit.
Annoyance Level: Mild. Called them up and the problem was resolved. We're happy they're looking out for us, but they really shouldn't have to if people would just be kind to their fellow man.
There were a few other cases where we just were not easily given the abilty to buy stuff. A large distributor benefits by us buying large products but they have to hesistate on every initial sale because of credit card fraud. Once we've established good relationships all this will be resolved, but each time we pickup a new distro we've got to transfer pages and pages of paperwork in fax form (sometimes also in snail mail form), make calls to say "hi, I'm really a company" and in some cases (like ingram micro) we have to sit at the phone and expect a callback. That way they know we're really calling from the number we say we are!
Wow, one never realizes just how bad it is until they get into retail. Crazy stuff. So, we're awaiting much of our orders to come through as we struggle to make people believe we're not stealing.
CodeMonkey
Why is our e-commerce site still holding out? Why aren't we live? Well, the site isn't 100% done yet, but that's not the show stopper. It is buying products! That should be easy right?
No sir, it's not that easy.
Case 1: Buying 10 xbox 360's (with PGR3 included)
We put in an order with the distributor to purchase a bunch of 360's at a fairly good deal. Yet, the order doens't go through. Why? We have to call them and talk to them in person and explain who we are and what we do. They then update our profile so we can purchase - the product first goes through.
Why: The site has been targeted for fraud many times. You must buy a 10-pack of Xbox 360's and you can make fairly good profit margins on them. The site doesn't require a tax-id (anyone can buy) so stolen credit cards are used to buy as many xbox 360's as possible. Those, now "stolen" 360's are sold for profit and the company gets screwed because it was an illegal credit card.
Annoyance Level: Mild. We don't mind having to provide an extra step to get the product if it is quick and easy.
Case 2: Buying large game inventory from distributor
The next distributor has great deals on games. However, before we can work with them we must fax them our "papers" that say we're a registered company in NH (and we don't have taxes). No big deal right? Next, we find we CANNOT use a c.o.d. to buy the inventory. The first transmission must be a wire, money order, or check in the mail. They still don't trust us, regardless of paperwork. Our second sale can be done with c.o.d - not the first
Why: Fraud. They're probably getting screwed by single "large" sales with spoofed paperwork.
Annoyance Level: High. We have to wire them funds, which costs us more money. That lost money cuts into our profit margins. It also requires us to take out money at the bank and bring it to Wal-Mart to wire for half the price of a bank (to save us some money). If we use check or money order the round trip time on our transaction is measured in weeks - not hours. We don't have weeks to wait.
Case 3: Bank shuts off card.
Bank of America shut off our credit card doing our third transaction with another distributor. Why? Because we ordered 10 xbox 360's a few days prior and then performed another large order, and here comes another? The bank was afraid our card was stolen and disabled it.
Why: Fraud! Dammit.
Annoyance Level: Mild. Called them up and the problem was resolved. We're happy they're looking out for us, but they really shouldn't have to if people would just be kind to their fellow man.
There were a few other cases where we just were not easily given the abilty to buy stuff. A large distributor benefits by us buying large products but they have to hesistate on every initial sale because of credit card fraud. Once we've established good relationships all this will be resolved, but each time we pickup a new distro we've got to transfer pages and pages of paperwork in fax form (sometimes also in snail mail form), make calls to say "hi, I'm really a company" and in some cases (like ingram micro) we have to sit at the phone and expect a callback. That way they know we're really calling from the number we say we are!
Wow, one never realizes just how bad it is until they get into retail. Crazy stuff. So, we're awaiting much of our orders to come through as we struggle to make people believe we're not stealing.
CodeMonkey
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Comments
Submitted by Gatsu on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:39
Submitted by TANK on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:45
Submitted by SirPoonga on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 10:47
Submitted by BrokenDesign on Tue, 10/17/2006 - 14:12
Submitted by fecknmental on Thu, 10/19/2006 - 10:18