Happy

Yawn.

What an overreaction over NOTHING. It has NOTHING to do with you as a person. It is just the computer flags a charge based on certain criteria.

And I seriously dont understand where the "was beyond embarrassed" sentiment is coming from. Annoying, YES. Embarrassed? Hell NO. Just tell the clerk you are XX miles from home and the finicky bank must think the card is stolen. Then call the bank to clear the fraud alert. Or if you are up to it, get the FA guy/gal on the phone and make him/her to wait on the line while you use the same card to finish the transaction - if this makes you feel better to "prove" to the clerk that you are no crook, that you do own the card.

One time I got a FA for a lunch bill of $20, about half an hour after I put on $$$$ on that BofA card. Called with a chuckle, the FA guy said it was the small charge that triggered it. Go figure.

Another time I got a FA follow up call (the card was not blocked) for a fill up at a gas station less than 10 miles from home.

Then my husband's Freedom was declined while mine wasn't when we used it for the quarterly promo last year - because his was not used in 6 months.

Just last week my Arrival+ got a FA at Target for $600ish charge when the card routinely sees $6000 charge else where. I am told by the FA woman that because some merchants have high security alerts... Yeah, we all know what TGT has gone thru last year...

Those are just more "memorable" fraud alerts in past 18 months. There are of course other "routine" FAs that everyone here has gotten.

Seriously, these days and age, unless you do not use a credit card, if you do, you WILL get FA sooner or later. It has absolutely NOTHING to do with your payment history, available credit, or relationship with the bank. It does sometimes have something to do with your charge pattern - something you dont do often would trigger FA. Use your brain and then you could see why is so.

As for your BA flight, just bring that canceled Freedom with you - they just need to see the card, they do not run the card so it does not need to be an open card.

satman40

I have more than one CC who cares, use another card..

I have had to call in with Citi, Chase, and even Amex.

Happy

Little charges at unmanned machines such as Gas Pump and Vending Machine are being viewed (programmed into the system) the most common ways for a thief to test whether a stolen card is a working card. So yeah, FA galore when using this. Though the system should have learned after a few times when it is used at the SAME location.

Yup. AMEX would not unblocked my card unless I go home and call them from the home phone... Then hung up and they called me back on the same number, before they lifted the block, despite when I called from the store I gave AMEX all my other cards' info including their cvs.

I have had FAs on all my cards which are from Citi, Chase, BofA, AMEX, US Bank and Barclays. The most ironic is the FAs tend to come on small amount like a few hundreds or just a lunch bill while cards routinely take on thousands charges without a blip.

Happy

People go out to do shopping would use their cards at multiple places - lunch, shop, have a break at a coffee shop, shop... besides the bank has NO IDEA what are being bought.

What triggered the FA may not necessarily has anything to do with the distance from home. It could very well be that particular Bed Bath and Beyond has had a string of fraudulent charges went thru, or even the chain has security breach recently thus the merchant becomes a security sensitive merchant (using the words a Barclays FA woman told me when my card was declined at Target for a measly $600ish while the same card could buy $6000 a pop elsewhere), then the system flagged the purchase.

It is really very simple to just call the bank and clear the block. Of course these days Chase' security dept being based in Philippines call center does not help the matter much, but there is truly no need to take it personal and have such huge upset - because FA is absolutely nothing personal. Yet the OP takes it as very personal. He needs to get over it.

The notion of expecting 100% success rate on Swipe is very naive in these days and age. Or borderline to be ignorant in my book.

Blueskyheaven

Happens to me rarely with chase and LOT with my recent Citi Thank you card.
But than I have to decide whether to let my anger control over me & my cards or I control my anger and keep the card in the end. I shouted back a few times at fraud alert reps cos I got really mad. I instead asked them to compensate me for the trouble. Even after giving them a heads up, it got declined twice on 2 ocassions.. I decided to keep my card.
Next time this happens, try to ask for points/miles CB compensation credit rather than canceling your CC.

There is a saying/proverb

You may have fire burning inside your stomach
But don't let the smoke come out of your mouth

DrGiggles

+1 agree on all points made above

flyershmlyer

you see the consensus here, OP?

AllieKat

Fraud alerts happen, they'll MOSTLY be a thing of the past come October with EMV, as EMV allows the bank to know the card is genuine. However, as we aren't going chip and PIN, thus lost/stolen remains a possibility, there will still be some.

Same city means nothing. People buy stolen track data by city.

philemer

The OP has received lots of helpful advice so I'm going to close this thread.