USAA suspended my credit card

[corn18]

They said 2 things alerted their fraud dept:

1. Large charges
2. Multiple payments per month

1. I charged my wife's surgery costs ($15k) this month to make room for all of it (I like getting 2.5% cash back). Also charged $13k for the new deck.
2. I usually pay the card off twice each month to keep the credit utilization low but this month I paid it 4 times to make room for the above big charges.

Apparently that equals fraud. I wouldn't mind so much if they had told me they were looking into it and suspended my card. They just suspended the card and when I called I spent 90 minutes on the phone trying to figure out why it was suspended.

Maybe the $2,500 they have sent me back so far this year has irritated them.

Corn

[creditcardfree]

Wow! That is surprising. Maybe it was a rewards issue. Would they issue you another card with different (lower) rewards?

[MooseBucks]

It is a fraud scenario...charge a bunch pay it off charge a bunch check bounces and then you disappear. Does your limit allow to just make one payment a month? Maybe make one large payment for the current balance on the due date. If you do that by the time the next statement is generated a few days later your balance will be low. Unless USAA is different most credit card companies only report to the credit bureaus when then statement is mailed and not several times a month.

[Nutria]

Suspended (which implies that they can re-enable it if the payment clears), or cancelled (implies permanence)?

[corn18]

Suspended (which implies that they can re-enable it if the payment clears), or cancelled (implies permanence)?

Suspended. It has never carried a balance and there are no pending payments.

I have no issue with them looking into fraud. But why just suspend it without telling me they did it? I look kindof goofy when I am trying to pay for postage at the post office and my card is declined for a $15 charge.

[Nutria]

Suspended. It has never carried a balance and there are no pending payments.

I have no issue with them looking into fraud. But why just suspend it without telling me they did it? I look kindof goofy when I am trying to pay for postage at the post office and my card is declined for a $15 charge.

Yeah, I sympathize with you. My wife was in Nashville, went to buy some groceries and the card was declined. She was not happy... I got a fraud alert email, called Chase and we straightened it out.

(Her BoA card accepted the charge, though. Very strange.)

[msomnipotent]

Chase declined my $200 worth of groceries for no good reason and then I got hit with $30,000 worth of fraudulent computer related charges a few days later. They suspect fraud for groceries but $30,000 of computer junk when we never charged that much or used the card for computer purchases is A OK in their book.

I don't think USAA would have a problem with making multiple payments per month. I check all of my cards every few days and pay any balances, although I don't have a USAA one. I can't see why they would suspend a card due to large rewards, either. It would make more sense to just notify you that your reward limit has been reached. Perhaps all the credit companies are more vigilant due to the Equifax breach? They should reinstate your card very soon. If not, I would get another one. Citibank doesn't seem to mind large purchases, in my experience. Capital One hasn't raised my $10,000 limit in the 20 years that I have owned it, so I limit its use.

[Nutria]

Chase declined my $200 worth of groceries for no good reason and then I got hit with $30,000 worth of fraudulent computer related charges a few days later. They suspect fraud for groceries but $30,000 of computer junk when we never charged that much or used the card for computer purchases is A OK in their book.

Very interesting (but in a bad way). They've always been good about that kind of thing with me (though the largest attempted fraud on me is just under $1000.)

Did they reverse the charges for you without much pain?

[scfr]

While it's good that they were looking out for potential fraud, like other commenters I'm surprised (in a bad way) that they didn't try to contact you before suspending your card. What if you had been on a trip with only 1 card? Yikes.

[msomnipotent]

Very interesting (but in a bad way). They've always been good about that kind of thing with me (though the largest attempted fraud on me is just under $1000.)

Did they reverse the charges for you without much pain?

Pretty much. It was really embarrassing when it was denied at the grocery store, though.

The same card was hacked 3 times in a short amount of time. A Chase rep insinuated that I was not being careful the 3rd time, but I pointed out that the account was used before I even got the replacement card in the mail, so it was their fault. Now I check all of my accounts several times a week. In fact, a fraudulent charge on my Capital One was just taken care of today. It was only for $9.97 and it said that related to a Paypal transaction. I only caught it because I know that my Capital One is not connected to my Paypal account.

[Nutria]

A Chase rep insinuated that I was not being careful the 3rd time, but I pointed out that the account was used before I even got the replacement card in the mail, so it was their fault.

How do crooks even do that?

Have they "hacked" Chase, or are they just trying "random" valid card numbers?

[msomnipotent]

How do crooks even do that?

Have they "hacked" Chase, or are they just trying "random" valid card numbers?

Good question! When it first happened, 3 of my cards were hacked at the same time, and all for large amounts. I went nuts trying to figure it out and then found that Amazon, Walmart, and Macy's had all 3 cards on file, so one of those clowns got hacked at some point and didn't announce it. Either Chase was also hacked, one of their employees was naughty, or my mailman was involved for the account to be used before I received it. I changed all of my passwords every time. I'm not sure about my Capital One to be charged recently. I Googled the name of the charge and several people posted about it. It posted as PAYPAL *TGSPORTSWEA 402-935-7733 CA 95131 US.

[snafu]

I had a CC suspended for 'suspected fraud' a few days after I attempted to check the balance, but used the wrong security password 1st attempt. They sent a e-mail and followed up about an hour later with a phone call. What is the normal procedure for USAA?

If time isn't a factor, I'd call 'customer service' back to clarify their procedure. You can fuss the 'embarrassment' caused by the decline at the P O, asking for a goodwill gesture credit.

[Like2Plan]

Suspended. It has never carried a balance and there are no pending payments.

I have no issue with them looking into fraud. But why just suspend it without telling me they did it? I look kindof goofy when I am trying to pay for postage at the post office and my card is declined for a $15 charge.

Maybe you can sign up for alerts--does USAA offer that? Chase has an option where they will send you an alert and you can take appropriate action. We had a few times where this happened to us (always embarrassing), but they made some adjustments and also signed us up for the alerts. As a result we haven't been rejected out of the blue like that in quite a while.

[Gailete]

Chase has alerted me several times to suspected fraud both on the part of using the card and the place that is doing the charging. My husband has poor vision and so at times has thought he was getting a 'free' sample of something that turns out to have a charge attached to it. I get a phone call. they tell me what is going on, I ask them to cancelt the charge and life goes on. Some of the on-line places they know to be fraud so they jump on those right away. However when I ordered a UK magazine that had foreign charges, they denied the charge. I called them up and explained what was going on and then tried again with no problem. They knew I wasn't in the UK when the charge was placed and I would rather they be extra cautious than not.