Am I being over sensitive?

[jkendrick]

I recently bought a high ticket item online from a small retailer. My credit card was approved and an email was sent to me that the item was being prepared for shipment.

A couple hours later I was walking through the local mall with my daughter when I got a phone call from a California area code on my cell phone.

The caller introduced himself as so and so from the retailer I purchased the item from and informed me that due to a high level of fraud they are using a service from a firm called VerID to help them verify the identity of the purchaser.

He then went on to read me a series of five questions with multiple part answers that were pulled from my personal credit history. They started with what are the last 4 digits of my Social Security number and went all the way through who held my mortgage, the last 3 addresses listed in my history, who the builder was that I bought my current house from, etc.

I made it clear to this guy that I was appalled by this since I didn't know him, didn't even know for certain he was even with the firm I bought the item from, and certainly didn't feel comfortable at all giving out all this private information over the phone. Even though I was just confirming information he was reading to me (which meant he already had it) it bothered the hell out of me.

I have since reiterated to them I will not buy from them again and that he had to realize that if the purchase process made me as a customer very uncomfortable then it should be considered a failure from his perspective. He didn't agree and has in fact gotten huffy that I begrudge his right to protect himself from fraud.

Am I being oversensitive to this? I know as a small business owner that nonpayment is a very bad thing. I also know that far to many people we don't know about are accessing our personal financial information all the time and adding a simple purchase as an event that triggers that just seems to much to me.

Your comments are welcome.

[Jon Westfall]

Well, I see this from the retailers perspective as well. Fraud is usually eaten by the retailer as the credit card companies use the standard "You didn't verify the users identity before processing the card" argument. However, there needs to be a healthy balance between the user & company.

What really concerns me about this is that he had a copy of your credit report, presumably without your permission (Was that on the order form?). If this is standard practice, then a lot of ticked people will start complaining to this retailer. The reason is this: Your credit is rated on a Beacon score. Everytime someone checks your credit report by pulling a copy, your beacon score drops a few points, and the credit check is recorded. So say you order 3 times from this retailer in 1 month, unaware of this. Then apply for a credit card. They reject you saying either your credit score has been pulled too many times or your score is too low, or both.

My father ran into this when he was in the mortgage business. He'd quote someone a price based on their credit, they'd tell him that they would have to "Get back to him", then visit a dozen other mortgage places looking for the best deal, and when they finally came back, my dad couldn't give them the same rate because the new credit report he pulled to complete the deal showed a far lower score than the original had days earlier.

[jkendrick]

I see it from his side too. No, there was no mention that he used this service and no permission granted on my part. I believe this service justifies what they do by isolating the retailer from the actual pulling of the credit information.

It's a shame that any business with a commercial account can pull your history without express permission on your part.

[Jason Dunn]

That's way overboard IMO - I'd never buy from a vendor that did that to me.

Thread moved to Off Topic, since it doesn't relate to Pocket PCs. ;-)