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My Canadian bank has an extremely sensitive anti-fraud mechanism that treats all foreign transactions as "suspicious". I do not need those anti-fraud measures (I'm okay with taking the risk) and want to be able to use the card worldwide without ever calling my bank to let them know I'm traveling somewhere. For example my European bank was by far less mistrustful of foreign transactions and the concept of calling your bank before you travel would leave most Europeans quite confused.

Is there a key phrase I can use to demand that the bank switches off all anti-fraud measures on my card? I've tried speaking to my bank about it and the answer was "no" but perhaps there's a trick to achieving what I need, e.g. I need to disable some sort of an insurance provided by Visa?

JonathanReez
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No. Since the bank is the one that has to assume the risk of unauthorized charges (by law, your liability can't be more than $50), it doesn't matter that you are "okay with taking the risk," because it's the bank's risk. The anti-fraud measures are there to protect the bank and are not optional.

You might consider getting a card with a different bank, as their anti-fraud algorithms vary widely, and others may be less sensitive, particularly after you've been a customer for a while and they learn you travel frequently. Some banks also allow you to set a travel alert through online banking, which is much faster than calling. Other banks will handle fraud alerts through text messages or their app; you can just respond that a charge was authorized and have your card reactivated within a minute rather than having to make international phone calls and talk to customer service.

Zach Lipton
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    Ah, so there's a law that's behind this paranoia... In Czech Republic you assume all the risk unless you buy extra insurance. – JonathanReez Feb 13 '18 at 20:01
  • I have received text messages more than once when using a card overseas. Interestingly, the most recent time I called to let them know the card was going overseas, they said since introduction of more secure chip-and-pin, they no longer recorded this. – Andrew Lazarus Feb 13 '18 at 20:05
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    The text messages work really well. I just had one on a US card issued by Chase (for an online purchase from the UK). Transaction failed. By the time I realized what happened, I had a message asking me to confirm it was me, respond "yes," click purchase again, transaction completed. – Zach Lipton Feb 13 '18 at 20:19
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    @JonathanReez Not only is there that law, but for competitive reasons, most Canadian banks cover 100% of fraudulent charges, which is above and beyond what the law requires. – Jim MacKenzie Feb 13 '18 at 20:33
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    "it's the bank's risk": This is why I am so angry when they claim that these measures are in place to protect me. – phoog Feb 13 '18 at 22:27
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    @JonathanReez that’s actually incorrect. Per EU regulations, it’s the bank’s responsibility to ensure that you authorised the payment. All those insurances they sell you are in most cases completely useless for you. But anti-fraud practices do indeed vary quite widely from one country to another and from one bank to another. – jcaron Feb 13 '18 at 22:51
  • @jcaron in that case it's even more strange that North American consumers blindly accept the reality that their card may be blocked at any time – JonathanReez Feb 13 '18 at 23:22
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    I would like to note that, depending on the fraud checks involved, you may not have the option to just "reactivate" your card. I recently purchased a new graphics card (~$800USD) from a local store I'd made similar large value purchases at before. I was unable to checkout, as the POS kept stating card declined. I logged into the mobile banking app, made sure I had funds, no alerts were there. I called customer service only to be told that due to the fraud check involved, they would be sending me a new card, as the one I used had been permanently deactivated. New number and everything. –  Feb 14 '18 at 01:20
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    @jcaron It's not an untrue statement, the policy does protect the customer as well. The bank is just extra motivated to put the policy in place because it also helps them. If you're more pessimistic, the other way around still works: it benefits them mainly but it also benefits the customer. – Cronax Feb 14 '18 at 09:45
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    @phoog I'm not sure getting angry when companies deliberately make misleading statements is a productive use of adrenaline, cortisol etc. They're doubtless protecting you, the hapless consumer, from even higher bank charges than they currently levy. – Spehro Pefhany Feb 14 '18 at 10:37
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    The fact that client's liability is limited by law doesn't technically prevent banks from taking the risk in exchange for an insurance fee for example. – Dmitry Grigoryev Feb 14 '18 at 11:49
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    @phoog they are protecting you. It's just that force of law is making them protect you whether you want it or not. – RonJohn Feb 14 '18 at 15:38
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    @RonJohn The fact that the law requires them to assume the risk means that the risk is theirs, not mine. But they're inconveniencing me to protect their own business interests by virtue of the fact that their fraud algorithms are so bad. If the risk were mine, I would be able to make my own cost/benefit decisions about the measures I want to take to protect myself, but I cannot. – phoog Feb 14 '18 at 15:44
  • @SpehroPefhany my cards have never held me to the $50 for which I legally could be liable when my accounts have been charged fraudulently. That's a business decision on their part, in which I have no say. I would gladly assume that risk to avoid having my card blocked for supposed "suspicious" activity, which invariably happens at the most inconvenient time -- when I'm traveling. But card issuers do not give me that option. – phoog Feb 14 '18 at 15:47
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    @Zymus That's crazy. At least in the U.S., usually if a bank puts a hold on your card for something like that, they just call you, you tell them, "Yeah, the purchase was legitimate," and they say "Ok, your card is reactivated. Have a nice day." Preemptively changing your account number without even talking to you seems really excessive unless they know your card has been compromised. – reirab Feb 14 '18 at 15:48
  • @reirab this was a US credit union. –  Feb 14 '18 at 15:50
  • @phoog "The fact that the law requires them to assume the risk means that the risk is theirs, not mine." If they didn't proactively protect you, then you'd have to manually dispute every charge. That would be a big, fat hassle. – RonJohn Feb 14 '18 at 16:59
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    @Zymus Ah, I see. Credit unions tend to be smaller and don't usually have the same level of sophisticated fraud detection as the major banks that issue most U.S. credit cards. – reirab Feb 14 '18 at 17:09
  • @RonJohn The 10 or so times my cards have been shut off when I was traveling have been far more of a hassle than the less-than-handful of fraudulent charges I've experienced in nearly 30 years. – phoog Feb 14 '18 at 18:39
  • @phoog : The bank's risk gets rolled over to the customer of course. In some sense, the rules are there to protect you -- from higher monthly fees. I suppose a "high-risk" product with higher fees and less international protection would be an option, but I doubt there'd be high demand for it. – FooBar Feb 15 '18 at 09:40
  • Czech Republic is under EU law which limits liability to at most 150€ unless you are demonstrably responsible for the misuse (e.g. by posting your card number on an internet forum or giving your card to a random stranger and admitting to doing that). Some member countries (Germany for example) have even lower caps, but the statement of you assuming all risk unless you buy an extra insurance is surely false. – Damon Feb 15 '18 at 10:40
  • @JonathanReez We blindly accept this reality, in exchange for the fact that many of us have had all-too-common experiences with card skimmers and fraudulent transactions on our cards. In one case, I was actually on a trip (within the USA) and my card was skimmed, I believe, at a convenience store. It was the only time I had used that card in several days, and the clerk let me scan it through the self-swipe kiosk before saying "Oh, that one doesn't work" and scanning it on her register. Within 2 days, someone tried to buy $3000 in airline tickets in Germany. And the bank blocked it. – GalacticCowboy Feb 15 '18 at 15:18
  • @JonathanReez Your claim about Czechia is not entirely true. This is what the banks try to tell you to get extra money from you. In reality, they would reimburse you if a card fraud happened. – yo' Feb 15 '18 at 23:12
  • Following this logic through leads to a conclusion that the banks should just forbid you to use a credit card at all as that incurs the smallest risk. – kaqqao Feb 16 '18 at 15:09
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    @kaqqao The bank profits from your use of the card, so they have an interest in you using it as much as possible. They also have an interest in it actually being you that uses it. Their anti-fraud measures try to balance those, and different banks will do it differently. – Zach Lipton Feb 16 '18 at 17:06
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It doesn't disable all security checks, but there is a phrase that will eliminate the need for advance travel notifications on cards in North America. It's "Hello, AmEx? I'd like to open x card." American Express does not require travel notifications for its cards. If you call and try to give them a notification of upcoming travel, the automated system informs you that they don't need it. Or, at least, that's what it does on my U.S.-issued AmEx cards.

In general, card products that are aimed more toward frequent travelers will have less impedances to using your card abroad. On the flip side, cards that are aimed more toward the average consumer may place a hold on your account and try to contact you for verification just for using your card within the same country a few hundred miles away from your home.

While I don't have as much personal experience with them, I would assume that the same, or at least similar, would hold for other non-AmEx cards aimed at frequent travelers. For example, the Chase Sapphire products, Citi's travel cards, etc. I've not had any trouble using Chase's Hyatt card abroad, though I do call and give them a travel notification before using it out-of-country.

The other benefit to using travel-focused cards when traveling internationally (aside from their respective card-specific benefits) is that they tend not to charge foreign transaction fees. However, you can also get that on some fee-free cards, too, such as Discover or Capital One cards.

reirab
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    My only problem with Amex would be that their acceptance rate is hit or miss outside of North America. – JonathanReez Feb 14 '18 at 16:09
  • @JonathanReez Fair point. It seems to have improved quite a bit in the last several years (both inside and outside of North America,) though, at least in my experience. Acceptance rates outside of North America would definitely be better with the Chase or Citi cards, though, since those are mostly Visa cards. I usually find AmEx's acceptance to be good at places that specifically cater to travelers (e.g. hotels and such,) but for, say, shopping at a local family-owned store, a Visa will definitely be more likely to be accepted (especially outside of North America.) – reirab Feb 14 '18 at 17:03
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    How does this even answer the question? – CGCampbell Feb 14 '18 at 17:13
  • @CGCampbell I read the question as being focused on how to avoid having to issue travel notifications in order to use a North American card abroad. The answer being to get a card designed for frequent travelers, which won't require that. – reirab Feb 14 '18 at 17:18
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    @CGCampbell it solves the implied problem of spending Canadian money hassle free when abroad – JonathanReez Feb 14 '18 at 17:19
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    AmEx is generally considered the world's second least accepted method of payment after Diner's Club. You want Master Card or Visa in Europe for example. – Separatrix Feb 15 '18 at 09:39
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    Worse than JCB, UnionPay or Interac @Separatrix ? – matt freake Feb 15 '18 at 12:44
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    @mattfreake, counted in terms of signs on the door saying "we do not accept the following" – Separatrix Feb 15 '18 at 12:46
  • @Separatrix There are lots of less-accepted networks around the world, though AmEx is indeed behind Visa and MasterCard and ahead of Discover/Diner's. Personally, I've used AmEx quite a bit in Europe and Asia, though I do agree that Visa has better acceptance and I typically carry one of those, too, for the places that don't take AmEx. – reirab Feb 15 '18 at 21:00
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Canadian banks are indeed sensitive and most of the algorithms to check are automatic. That being said, not all foreign transactions are treated suspiciously but when they are, it is very inconvenient as this is something that caused me issues several times.

Calling your bank ahead of time is not an obligation but a recommendation but that reduces the cases when the suspicious activity alert is raised. I have had particularly frequent issues with Mastercard from Citibank Canada (at the time) and got them to dial it down to a more reasonable level for many years by insisting on the phone and getting escalated to a higher level agent. Some banks now allow you to enter your travel plans electronically which is more convenient yet still an annoyance.

With the conversion to credit cards with chips that happened over the last few years, alerts have been reduced somewhat but I did get into trouble for particularly odd timing. For example, spending at home in Montreal than starting to spend away in and booking a hotel for my next destination or buying a gift remotely for someone. This sequence of transaction location really get them, so what I do is switch cards to break down the hops across countries. I can do this since I have credit cards with 5 banks in Canada but that does not apply to everyone.

Some destinations are, according to the bank, more suspicious. For example, all online transactions I did with Brazil were blocked but I did manage to make some in person while there. I did complain and did not get much of an answer other than the system did not authorize.

The more you travel with regularity, the more the algorithm adapts to your patterns. Also some banks are more drastic then others. As I mentioned, Citibank tends to block transactions while Tangerine lets them through usually and calls to verify suspicious transactions which at least does not leave you stranded somewhere unable to purchase gaz or pay your car rental before taking your flight home. These things happened to me when I had fewer cards or in places where only one worked such as Iceland where gas stations are mostly unattended and only HSBC worked.

Itai
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  • Some banks now allow you to enter your travel plans electronically which is more convenient yet still an annoyance. With RBC I used to send a one-sentence email to my "personal banker", to tell her when I was taking my cards out of the country. – ChrisW Feb 15 '18 at 19:28
  • Tangerine lets you declare your travel dates and destination countries using online banking. – 200_success Feb 16 '18 at 00:10
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It's likely your bank is extra-sensitive to international purchase risk because you have only lived in Canada for a few weeks, so your Canadian account is very new. If you lived here several years and traveled regularly you probably wouldn't have the issue.

All I can suggest is to have a mobile phone number that's affordable for the bank to call, and have it on file. Many banks will let a charge through, even if questionable, then call you to verify it was legitimate. (My bank, BMO, does this.)

Jim MacKenzie
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I can't answer directly w.r.t. law or bank policy, but a way to mitigate the issue would be to use either 1. an internet-based bank (safer than it sounds, Ally or Bank of Internet for example) and/or 2. A card that has specific features for international travel (Charles Schwab high-yield investor checking Visa, for example). I traveled internationally for a year with one of each of these and there were times I was in three different countries in a week - I never had any issues with fraud prevention (except one time where they successfully detected fraud) and never paid an ATM fee or an excessively high currency conversion. I also never informed anyone of my plans.

jayce
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