Easy Answers Are Better
Recently, my business credit card number was compromised and someone used it to go on a bit of a shopping spree at Walmart and Target stores in the Kenosha area. This is not the first time my business credit card account has been tampered with and it’s incredibly inconvenient when it happens.
First, the bank immediately cancels the card and sends you a new one. This means that all the online accounts I have containing my business credit card number, sites like domain registrars and airlines, have to be updated. Also, items that are on auto renew now won’t auto renew until I get the notice that the old credit card number didn’t go through.
The truly ridiculous thing is that my bank has the answer to this problem; issue business credit cards with smart chips in them so that perpetrators can’t produce counterfeit cards using a stolen number. It’s my understanding that chip card numbers don’t work without the chip. So, even though it’s incredible that national chains like Walmart and Target still don’t require photo ID when someone is charging, say, more than $500 to a card, this becomes less of a pain because the chip does their job for them.
I’ve asked our company bank to issue all members of our staff who have business credit cards to change them out with chip cards. You’d think it would be easy. It’s not. Apparently, chip cards are only available if you open up an entirely new credit card account. This means losing all of the rewards points we’ve accumulated on the main account, as well as filling out a bunch of new paperwork. As a customer who’s been victimized by shoddy security from the bank and retailers, I shouldn’t have to do more work to correct the problem.
I want an Easy Answer. And the Easy Answer is to swap out all of the existing cards with new, improved chip versions. I try to always provide Easy Answers to my clients. And I’m looking for a bank that will as well.
P.S. Through deductive thinking, I’m pretty sure I know where my credit card number was compromised. It’s only happened to me twice and BOTH times were after I stayed at a certain hotel in downtown Milwaukee. Once was with my personal credit card, the second with my business. So, even though I can’t prove it, my gut tells me I’m right and I will never stay there again even though it’s part of the group of hotels I stay at whenever I travel.
