Barclaycard Rewards Visa and US Car rental

Yak58

The good news with this card is that we saved a fortune in transaction fees in a 3 week road trip across the USA this month. However - beware car hire companies!! Dollar, Thrifty and Hertz will not accept this card as it does not have a customer name on the front! Even though the card number and name are on the back! And we had our passports, driving licences all as other ID. All 3 car hire companies would not accept it in New York and California. Apparently their computer system forces them to photograph only the front to capture the name. Fortunately we had another card with us or our road trip would not have been possible. 

NewUser1972

That will have to change pretty quick or many (most) people will have a problem soon.  Neither my Santander credit card or my Natwest Debit card have my name embossed or even printed on the front any more. I also have a Curve card and that doesnt either. I am not sure which companies still do this as most seem to be migrating away from this as its not required any more due to lack of the other swipe machines and the rise of contactless.  Thanks for pointing this out though as it could catch many out!

jbrassy

Yak58 said:

The good news with this card is that we saved a fortune in transaction fees in a 3 week road trip across the USA this month. However - beware car hire companies!! Dollar, Thrifty and Hertz will not accept this card as it does not have a customer name on the front! Even though the card number and name are on the back! And we had our passports, driving licences all as other ID. All 3 car hire companies would not accept it in New York and California. Apparently their computer system forces them to photograph only the front to capture the name. Fortunately we had another card with us or our road trip would not have been possible. 

That's really weird. I've never hired a car in the US, but have in lots of other countries. No one has ever photographed my credit card. Luckily I have the old style BC Rewards card which has number and name on the front, but this will eventually expire. 

Gerry1

I have a Chase debit card so it probably wouldn't qualify anyway, but it doesn't have the card number on it anywhere !  On the front it has only the Chase name and logo, my first name and one initial.  Really great for security if lost because the app also allows you to turn off contactless and PIN transaction at will.

But the US car rental companies need to get up to date, sounds like they're still expecting to take mechanical imprints and ballpoint signatures.

Wonder whether pay at the pump still asks overseas visitors to enter a US zip code, or has Chip & PIN finally reached their shores?

lr1277

Your suggestion that car hire companies will only allow you to hire a car if the account holders details are on the front of the card did worry me a bit.

Then I searched onsomething like 'card details on the front of the card USA' and found this article on Slate, dated 2018:

https://slate.com/business/2018/04/why-are-credit-card-numbers-on-the-back-of-the-card-now.html 

So if American credit cards are increasingly have the card details on the reverse of the card, how can Americans hire a car?

Puzzling to me.

Perhaps you should repost the part of your post about needing card detais on the front of the card on the Travel, flight, currency board as it might be useful there?

paul_c123

Why are they photographing the front? Surely there's rules about storing the credit card number, ie they can't.

COIAHLGW

I have American cards, and increasingly there the details are on the back only also.  I presume this is a losing proposition for the car hire companies, although I wonder this would be for foreign renters.

Gerry1 said:

Wonder whether pay at the pump still asks overseas visitors to enter a US zip code, or has Chip & PIN finally reached their shores?

In my experience it is still primarily chip and pin only.  You may be lucky with contactless.

Marchitiello

Were you a member of any of those company’s own reward scheme? I am Hertz’s President Circle and Avis President Club status and my cards details are stored in my profile, even without pre-booking. I have last rented in Florida this past March and used at the boot  without pre booking and presented my Amex Platinum Charge Card (yes 3% fee on a $50 daily rent, but worth it for the Hassle free Car Hire insurance included), which as soon as it was put through the POS, brought up all my Avis details on the lady’s screen.  This card has only my name at the front and all other details are at the back, but wondering if they were insisting in photographing (I am guessing scanning, as no photo was taken of my card) the front with your name, could they not have just taken a picture / scan of the back just covering the signature slip (and CVV2) ? 

Gerry1

Marchitiello said:

...could they not have just taken a picture / scan of the back just covering the signature slip (and CVV2) ? 

I thought merchants are not allowed to store CVVs?

Gerry1

Marchitiello said:

...presented my Amex Platinum Charge Card (yes 3% fee on a $50 daily rent, but worth it for the Hassle free Car Hire insurance included)

Are you sure that includes full insurance, including damage / injuries caused to third parties?  That's a very unusual benefit on UK cards.

WillPS

Gerry1 said:

Marchitiello said:

...presented my Amex Platinum Charge Card (yes 3% fee on a $50 daily rent, but worth it for the Hassle free Car Hire insurance included)

Are you sure that includes full insurance, including damage / injuries caused to third parties?  That's a very unusual benefit on UK cards.

Amex Platinum is an unusual card - it has an annual fee of £575 for one thing!

Insurance & Protection | Platinum Card Benefits | Amex UK (americanexpress.com)