Banks attitude towards purchasing things in foreign currency and other stuff

book12

I was wondering how banks attitude towards customer for the following:

• foreign currency
• legal downloads of media from websites (for example, legal mp3 downloads from iTunes and renting shows online through 4OD, etc...)
• purchasing stuff overseas

I am asking this because I got a feeling that some banks don't like it when customers do those kinds of things, and might restrict/freeze, or even close bank accounts. I know they sometimes check on customers account usage and all that to check for unfamilar use or illegal use.

I would also like to purchase mp3s from iTunes.

Opinons appreciated.

Rafter

book12,

These purchases are the kind of thing a fraudster might purchase because controls in other countries often aren't as strong and transactions via the net might be less traceable or might be outside the juristiction of the UK police.

Suggest you get yourself an Egg card or a Nationwide card. Reason being that Egg have a good fraud detection system with automated messages, so even if they are suspicious you can usually get your account up and running again very quickly.

Nationwide are the card of choice for overseas purchases, because their currency conversion rates and charges are the cheapest. This also means they will be used to customers using their card for overseas purchases and therefore less likely to get all flustered about it!

Good luck

R.

book12

Rafter wrote: »

book12,

These purchases are the kind of thing a fraudster might purchase because controls in other countries often aren't as strong and transactions via the net might be less traceable or might be outside the juristiction of the UK police.

Suggest you get yourself an Egg card or a Nationwide card. Reason being that Egg have a good fraud detection system with automated messages, so even if they are suspicious you can usually get your account up and running again very quickly.

Nationwide are the card of choice for overseas purchases, because their currency conversion rates and charges are the cheapest. This also means they will be used to customers using their card for overseas purchases and therefore less likely to get all flustered about it!

Good luck

R.

I always look at the website to see if it's legitimate or not. If it's not, I won't purchase anything from there. I haven't purchased anything with a foreign currency before, so if I do, it will be my first time. I will rarely buy in foreign currency anyway, as the UK have what I need. If they don't, I will revert to foreign sites as a last resort.

Egg and Nationwide seem to be strict on their bank accounts. I would just use the bank account that I have right now. The Egg card is a credit card, and not sure if my credit history is good enough for it.

agsnu

Many people purchase many of the above without any problems. You might get the transaction fail and then a phone call shortly after, just to confirm. Or it might go through and you'll get a follow-up to check. But no bank is just going to close your account for purchasing things from a web site in another country.

Extant

...who pays for illegal downloads?

Anyway, banks don't tend to care what you're spending your money on per se. Your purchases might trigger off anti-fraud measures, but unless you're hammering the account with such purchases, you shouldn't have any problems whatsoever.

Extant

Also, many banks have adaptive fraud countermeasures, or are starting to employ them - i.e. they will start to recognize your spending habits.