Debit Card Payments Rejected over Telephone by Companies Using an Address Checker

Leodogger

I have moved house 8 mths ago and previous to this used the same debit card for payments over the telephone for years without a problem. I have twice recently had the debit card rejected for a payment due to an address checker on their systems (one insurance company and one bank when applying for a currency card). My bank assures me that the account is fine and that when the payment is trying to be taken, the wrong address comes through and it is rejected, even though I have sent a copy of my bank statement to the first bank I used to open a currency card account attempting to take the payment (in the end they had to take off the address code checker security on the application to make the transfers take place). I have checked with Royal Mail postcode checker and my address is there, but I don't know if either of the companies use this method to check my address. Twice I have had to use a different credit card which went through OK, with the same address registered to it. The bank can't help and neither can the companies I have used to make the payment to find out why my address is being rejected. I have used the same bank and debit card for 30 plus yrs and obviously changed my address with them when I moved and never had this problem before moving here.

Could it be something to do with them doing a credit agency check when processing the payment as I have not got my address changed with Experian or any other agency when we moved but as I say I use the same debit card to make purchases on line since moving here without problem and can make manual payments over the telephone giving them my card details instead of them using the automated address input on their systems.

Has anyone else had this problem? I am completely stumped but this is giving me great problems as I have to keep using a credit card to make payments using their automated address check systems.

custardy

Are you in a flat?

Leodogger

custardy wrote: »

Are you in a flat?

No we live in a bungalow.

InsideInsurance

You need to be clearer what process of checking you are referring to.

1) Your banks AVS check against the debit card
2) An ID check against the CRA file

Your comments are a little unclear which of the two it is.

AVS comes in two formats, partial or full. Both only check the numerical part of your address and not the full address. Partial only checks the numbers in the postcode and full checks the house number and the postcode.

So if you had the address 4 Bishopsgate, London, EC3A9BA then for a partial check they'd ask if 39 is correct and for a full check they'd ask if 439 is correct.

Where problems arise is where there are multiple ways of writing the address and in particular doing a full check. So for example my mother would always write the address as House Name, Street Name, Town and drop the house number. This would then fail a full AVS check because the bank did hold it as House Name, 1, Street Name, Town

You need to confirm the address the bank holds for you and ensure that its correct and that when you write your address for companies (or the website prepopulates your address) that its identical.


If its a CRA file check then its nothing to do with your bank

Leodogger

InsideInsurance wrote: »

You need to be clearer what process of checking you are referring to.

1) Your banks AVS check against the debit card
2) An ID check against the CRA file

Your comments are a little unclear which of the two it is.

AVS comes in two formats, partial or full. Both only check the numerical part of your address and not the full address. Partial only checks the numbers in the postcode and full checks the house number and the postcode.

So if you had the address 4 Bishopsgate, London, EC3A9BA then for a partial check they'd ask if 39 is correct and for a full check they'd ask if 439 is correct.

Where problems arise is where there are multiple ways of writing the address and in particular doing a full check. So for example my mother would always write the address as House Name, Street Name, Town and drop the house number. This would then fail a full AVS check because the bank did hold it as House Name, 1, Street Name, Town

You need to confirm the address the bank holds for you and ensure that its correct and that when you write your address for companies (or the website prepopulates your address) that its identical.


If its a CRA file check then its nothing to do with your bank

All I was told by the insurance company was when they tried to take the payment after they entered the postcode into the automatic address checker, the address comes up, they checked it with me and then when trying to take the payment, the payment is rejected. When I checked with the bank they looked at the payment they were trying to take and said that the address coming through to the bank did not match the address they were holding and so rejected the payment. They would not tell me what address it was that was coming through, just that there was an incompatibility but refused to give me any further detail as it was against data protection. As I said with the previous instance when my card was rejected, I had to send a copy of my bank statement and they still couldn't get the account to accept cash transactions, so they took the security which does the address check off my account.

Basically I am banging my head up against a brick wall, the bank told me to ask for the insurance company's technical dept to find out what the incompatibility is but the insurance company said they haven't got a technical dept as such, it is just the automatic address checker that inputs the full address from the postcode which comes up on their system as my correct address but when they try to take the payment, the system is rejecting the debit card payment.

I wondered if it is because the address checker does a credit agency check at the same time and as my address on my credit rating agency is my old address 8 months ago I think as I have not changed it with them and i don't know who is responsible for that.

We did register on the electoral roll for the european elections in April so I know that the council holds my correct address.

Leodogger

JWhite wrote: »

All I was told by the insurance company was when they tried to take the payment after they entered the postcode into the automatic address checker, the address comes up, they checked it with me and then when trying to take the payment, the payment is rejected. When I checked with the bank they looked at the payment they were trying to take and said that the address coming through to the bank did not match the address they were holding and so rejected the payment. They would not tell me what address it was that was coming through, just that there was an incompatibility but refused to give me any further detail as it was against data protection. As I said with the previous instance when my card was rejected, I had to send a copy of my bank statement and they still couldn't get the account to accept cash transactions, so they took the security which does the address check off my account.

Basically I am banging my head up against a brick wall, the bank told me to ask for the insurance company's technical dept to find out what the incompatibility is but the insurance company said they haven't got a technical dept as such, it is just the automatic address checker that inputs the full address from the postcode which comes up on their system as my correct address but when they try to take the payment, the system is rejecting the debit card payment.

I wondered if it is because the address checker does a credit agency check at the same time and as my address on my credit rating agency is my old address 8 months ago I think as I have not changed it with them and i don't know who is responsible for that.

We did register on the electoral roll for the european elections in April so I know that the council holds my correct address.

By the way, just to clarify, my address at my bank is held as Names on the account (joint account but they said this would not cause a conflict with payments if the payment is being taken in a single name), House No., Street Name, Town, Post Code and this is exactly what I gave the insurance company.

SuperHan

I couldn't see it in your OP, but does your bank definitely have your address correct? Do you get bank statements correctly addressed? As this seems to be the weak link.

Leodogger

SuperHan wrote: »

I couldn't see it in your OP, but does your bank definitely have your address correct? Do you get bank statements correctly addressed? As this seems to be the weak link.

Yes double checked the address with the bank and as I say, I even provided a bank statement to the finance company I was trying to open a currency card account with. Even with the statement to hand to input the address exactly the same way, they could not get the payment to go through without being rejected.

Leodogger

I have had a reply from Experian to say that the problem has to be with the company inputting the address although as I say this has happened twice and the first time, they used my bank statement to input the address and the payment was still refused ! So even Experian cannot explain why this is happening. As I say, I have used this debit card for 30 yrs and never had a problem until I have tried to use it with companies using an address checker so don't understand what the problem may be.

Has this happened to anyone else ?

eddddy

JWhite wrote: »

All I was told by the insurance company was when they tried to take the payment after they entered the postcode into the automatic address checker, the address comes up, they checked it with me....

Hi JWhite

So they are finding your address from typing in your postcode. (So it's probably using Royal Mail's Postcode Address File.)

It's worth checking what your address actually looks like in Royal Mail's PAF - you can check it here:
http://www.royalmail.com/find-a-postcode


There might be a discrepancy which isn't obvious when you say it over the phone, but you can spot when you look at it.

And check a few other addresses on the PAF to see if yours is presented in an unusual way (e.g. somebody at Royal Mail keyed house number in the wrong field.)

If the PAF is wrong, there is a link to report it on the Royal Mail page.

Leodogger

eddddy wrote: »

Hi JWhite

So they are finding your address from typing in your postcode. (So it's probably using Royal Mail's Postcode Address File.)

It's worth checking what your address actually looks like in Royal Mail's PAF - you can check it here:
http://www.royalmail.com/find-a-postcode


There might be a discrepancy which isn't obvious when you say it over the phone, but you can spot when you look at it.

And check a few other addresses on the PAF to see if yours is presented in an unusual way (e.g. somebody at Royal Mail keyed house number in the wrong field.)

If the PAF is wrong, there is a link to report it on the Royal Mail page.

I did check it with the Royal Mail web site but it looked identical but I will check with them as you say that there is not a mistake in the field they entered.

Thanks !