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#1108983 - 01/12/09 01:54 PM Unauthorized Debit Card Charges
GAGirl66 Offline
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Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 2
A bank customer had a debit card on a business account to be copied. The fraudulent card was used for numerous unauthorized charges. The customer caught the issue right and phoned the bank having his card and the duplicate hot carded. All unauthorized charges were returned as unauthorized. Merchants will not refund charges saying that the charges were signed and they had no method to verify the true signer, so they have no liability. Is this correct? Does the merchant retain no liability if any signature is obtained. Please advise.

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eBanking / Technology
#1108987 - 01/12/09 02:02 PM Re: Unauthorized Debit Card Charges GAGirl66
Lisa V Offline
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Lisa V
Joined: Jan 2009
Posts: 7
Texas
From everything I have learned, if the merchant swiped the card, received an authorization and the slip was signed, the merchant is not responsible for any of the fraudulent charges.

This is the unfair side of the plastic world.

I was once told, unless we could get our hands on the fraudulent card that was used, the merchant has no liability for the chanrges.

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#1109089 - 01/12/09 03:41 PM Re: Unauthorized Debit Card Charges Lisa V
Skittles Online
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Skittles
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 13,965
TN
This is true. As long as the merchant did what he/she was supposed to do, they are out of it. This is just the 'cost of doing business', unfortunately.
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#1109105 - 01/12/09 03:52 PM Re: Unauthorized Debit Card Charges Lisa V
ktac MITCH Offline
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ktac MITCH
Joined: May 2005
Posts: 1,813
Giant side of TX
Originally Posted By: Lisa V
.. . . . I was once told, unless we could get our hands on the fraudulent card that was used, the merchant has no liability for the chanrges.

I beleive this is correct, because when there was a bogus card used the logic is
1. Merchant got authorization & verified the sig with the card presented
(of course whoever created the bogus card put whatever name they wanted to sign & most likely had bogus ID for)
2. Only hope for the issuing bank is to prove the sig did not match the card presented = getting the bogus card that was used to compare with the merchant's signed receipt.
And what is the likelyhood of that ; yeah ZERO
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#1109215 - 01/12/09 05:56 PM Re: Unauthorized Debit Card Charges ktac MITCH
Skittles Online
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Skittles
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TN
KtacMITCH - even if the bank got the signature and compared it - would the merchant be liable? I thought as long as they followed procedures and got an authorization they were out of the loop. AND they don't have to obtain ID either. Am I WAY off base here?
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#1115637 - 01/22/09 10:20 PM Re: Unauthorized Debit Card Charges Skittles
C_Groat Offline
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Joined: Mar 2006
Posts: 70
Salt Lake City, UT
Both MC and Visa have a compliance right for 'failure to compare signatures,' but it is only valid on Lost or stolen cards, not counterfeit and as mentioned above the bank must have captured the lost/stolen card. For comparison purposes, the signature cannot be a scribble and the signature must be clear to show that the name on the card John Smith was different that the signature of Mary Jane on the sales draft. In my 13+ years, I have only used this compliance right maybe 5 times so it does not happen often.

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