I have a doubt. While paying someone by credit card or paypal, must we give the real (postal) address? Or even in paypal, must we fill the real address (in the account info.) to add a credit card? Wouldnt that be unsafe? Keeping this in view, is it better to give an address from another country (even though the credit card is from another) while paying these merchants? I am really confused about this. Can someone please explain?
It is all about trust. If you want to use Paypal, you need to trust it and it needs to trust you. If you provide fake information then there is no way they can trust you and besides if you pay via credit card, part of the credit card verification process is to validate your name, address, credit card number, expiry date and CVV2 number. If any details does not match, the transaction will fail. This is basically to protect the card holder because if your card details are stolen, most likely the thief would not have full details. If you provide false information, it is as good as to consider that you are using stolen credit card details. Besides, Paypal requires you to provide accurate information otherwise they have every right to limit your account and prevent you from using it ever again. It is not unsafe as I provide real information and have not faced any problems. Companies like Paypal are governed by rules and laws and they cannot breach customer's privacy. If you pay to an online site, it would most likely used a 3rd party accredited payment processor, you should not need to worry.
AVS is used as a form of verification that the billing address that was typed in matches what's on the customer's card database. In any event if it fails then you may want to call the customer to verify that the item is legit. Joe