Credit Card Expiration Dates Are Obsolete

[LiberalFighter]

Source: ITManagement Date: 5/22/2006

Most consumers think their credit card expiration dates -- the month and year in which their cards are supposed to be renewed -- are a sacrosant security feature, without which a business can't process a payment.

In fact, big players in the U.S. consumer-sales industry have developed informal agreements with credit-card issuers that allow charges to be made to consumers' credit cards without specifying the expiry month and year. This procedure works even after an individual's card has expired and been re-issued with a new expiration date.

Most surprisingly, this end run around expiration dates is little known by most businesses. The procedure is so new it isn't written down anywhere in credit-card regulations. The process exists only as an understanding between card issuers and a few companies that know how the system works.

Why Expiration Dates No Longer Matter

Is the ability to charge credit cards without an expiration date a security risk for consumers? After investigating the new, informal procedures, I believe it is not.

[PeaceNikki]

1. Working in retail, I've never seen a processor that will process a card for authorization without it

And, a valid one, at that.

[Yael]

3. I thought that too -- and asked Bank of America about it

They said that those CC processing solutions don't verify the expiration date. Odd that -- you can't buy a stick of gum online unless your credit card is still valid. They had no response other than to say that "it was the way the verification through VISA/MC/AmExp worked"

[Yael]

2. Tell me about it

A mastercard of mine that expired in 10/06 (and whose company, MBNA, no longer exists -- the account taken over by AmExp through Bank of America in 09/06) was hit by Micro$oft for an annual fee (!!!) of $29.95 for a hotmail account (that I haven't used in 3 years) in 4/07 for the annual fees and I am still contesting it.

[Bravo Zulu]

5. refer it to the BBB

sometimes the Better Business Bureau can work miracle's!

[Yael]

7. Good point!

Thanks!

[NYC]

4. Didn't work for me.

My credit card expired the end of May. I hadn't realized it, and hadn't received a new card.

When I tried to use the card in June, the store refused. I asked them to call Visa. I spoke to the man for quite a while, but in the end, I couldn't use the card.

The man at Visa said I would receive a new card within a few days. I did. It had the new expiration date, but had the same account number. In other words, they don't seem worried about the card that went astray.

[gravity]

6. I think they are more of an annoyance than a security feature

If I lose a card, I report it instead of waiting until it expires.