Just in case you did not know yet or if you are new to international e-commerce, do not accept credit card orders form a town called accra in Ghana. These guys actually do not steal any credit cards but running software programs which try to calculate valid credit card combination including the 3 digit security number. Once a valid combination is found, they placing orders for all sorts of products until the credit card has been canceled. The thing is, with this method it could be your credit card numbers tomorrow they have calculated. I have been caught out when an order has been placed on my website a long time ago. The order was for an unusual high amount of goods ordered and being new in the business I was not suspicious at all but rather happy. I sent the order and about a week later I had a call from my bank telling me that I have charged a credit card without authorisation of the owner. The bank refunded the money to the card holder and i ended up with loosing my goods plus the currier costs for sending the order. Several weeks later after these fraudsters received their order I got bombarded with new orders. Being a good boy, I reported the credit card combination to my bank so that they can cancel it and inform the card holder. Than I thought since I have the delivery address which is a valid address I pass this info on to the police here in New Zealand only to be told that there is nothing that they can do about it. So I called the FBI Internet Fraud Department and checked if they are interested in names and contact details of an internation fraud ring but to my disappointment I been told again that there is nothing they can do about it. Of cause I tried Visa, MasterCard and AMEX as well with the same result. The bottom line is, that you as a credit card merchant have no protection whatsoever. Banks and credit card companies keep quiet about it since they do not loose any money over this. They simply take the funds of the merchants account and credit it back to the card holder. Under no circumstances do they want the credit card holder loosing confidence using their credit cards. Just now I started getting order again from Gahana and thought I let you guys know about it before you get burned. Anyway – do not accept credit card orders from Accra in Ghana!
Well, it's tempting if you are new to selling online and get a good order. You see the dollar signs and thats it.
I am in the same situation last Sep. I lost an amount money .The credit card thieves's address is in Venezuela. So if someone make credit card payment from Venezuela, you should double check with your bank.
?!!! As xaxecom has just shown there are crooks in every nation on earth. You just have to be careful and take all necessary precautions when dealing online.
this is really funny people do this i have been a victim before too.that is why am now planing to do authorisation for purchases on my site manually so can anyone tell me how to check for the authorisation of purchases made from a credit card on my store hope to hear from you guys thank you
Juat a small note check the IP address of the sale as the shipping country might be UK or Germany or something like that but the IP is Ghuana or some other crap rip off country!
And do you think this happens only in Ghana ? I bet there are many many countries which are using the same method
LOL I just employed an accountant from Ghana LOL Seriously because of threads like this even with his two degrees he cannot get work with anything involving money. Seems that credit card companies and merchants like us are not the only victims. 10 years education wasted.