This may not even be a case of Visa Account Updater. Recurrent charges (subscriptions, gyms etc) may not even be sent online, they are just processed in batch. Visa/Mastercard is a dual message system where a real-time auth is followed by an overnight batch which clears the auth and posts the actual transaction to the account. Transactions posted in batch cannot be denied per se, but can generate automatic reversals that would be sent in the next batch.
Under the bonnet, card hosts like Base2000 have an underlying account number for the credit facility, and various PANs (card numbers) are attached to that. Even if a singular card is cancelled, transactions posted in batch can be routed to the appropriate credit facility as the host knows all current and past PANs.
If you have subscriptions that are difficult to cancel, the best path is to ask your bank to block and/or dispute the transactions in question. Getting a new card with a new PAN may not be sufficient.
Cancelling a credit card doesn't mean the linked subscriptions just disappear. Plenty of people find that out the hard way when their unpaid bills are sent to collections.
Right. But it's also not the bank (or Visa's) job to act as an arbiter for paying my subscriptions, especially if I'm in dispute with the merchant. If I am advising the bank / issuer that I do not want to authorize these transactions, it's not on them to say "well, we're here to help them continue to be able to authorize them, not for you to keep your money."
That's an issue between me and the merchant. I don't want MY bank acting as an enabler for the merchant over my wishes, with my money.
You're thinking like an engineer. From the perspective of the bank, you (the individual) has given a merchant (gym etc) a standing authority to bill you. That authority is between you and the merchant, not between your specific card number and their payment processor. Having your card reissued is not a withdrawal of that authority.
Based on the brief detail provided, I think OP's mistake was to cancel/reissue the card rather than dispute the charge / block the merchant.
I used to work at a different bank, and we were able to disable the auto billing update on a card so that when we went to close the card and send one with a new number, no merchants would be notified of the new account. Some workers didn't know this could be done... I'd be surprised if Wells Fargo didn't have a way to turn this off.
For subscriptions, you should use a service like privacy.com or corporate companies like mercury, brex, ramp etc which provides digital cards that you can set limits on.
They also provide ability to pause card after which no transaction would go through.
> Next month, guess what? A bunch of the same charges again
What kind of charges? Did you cancel the subscriptions, disputed them with the bank? Sometimes I read advice to "just cancel the card" instead of proper cancelling a subscription.
Once upon a time, Keybank refused to block a merchant from debiting my account (I can't remember if by card or account number, it was a decade ago), because, they said, "if I hadn't canceled, I had an active subscription". They seemed apathetic to the concept that it wasn't their job to facilitate the merchant's attempt to have payment rendered (if I'm having a hard time canceling a subscription and this is my resort, then that's between me and the merchant. The bank is a neutral party, at worst - ideally they should be supportive of me saying "I don't want this entity to take my money").
This may not even be a case of Visa Account Updater. Recurrent charges (subscriptions, gyms etc) may not even be sent online, they are just processed in batch. Visa/Mastercard is a dual message system where a real-time auth is followed by an overnight batch which clears the auth and posts the actual transaction to the account. Transactions posted in batch cannot be denied per se, but can generate automatic reversals that would be sent in the next batch.
Under the bonnet, card hosts like Base2000 have an underlying account number for the credit facility, and various PANs (card numbers) are attached to that. Even if a singular card is cancelled, transactions posted in batch can be routed to the appropriate credit facility as the host knows all current and past PANs.
If you have subscriptions that are difficult to cancel, the best path is to ask your bank to block and/or dispute the transactions in question. Getting a new card with a new PAN may not be sufficient.
Good doc on PANs https://stripe.com/resources/more/primary-account-numbers
>difficult to cancel subscriptions
>magically reroutes to new card numbers no matter how complicated the change
>out $500
I don't need to play 20 Questions to know you're talking about legalzoom
Amex will issue merchant blocks to prevent future charges; perhaps your issuer can do so? (This is a suggestion to help immediate mitigation only.)
Yeah I did this now, I'm just left without the $500 they stole
Cancelling a credit card doesn't mean the linked subscriptions just disappear. Plenty of people find that out the hard way when their unpaid bills are sent to collections.
Right. But it's also not the bank (or Visa's) job to act as an arbiter for paying my subscriptions, especially if I'm in dispute with the merchant. If I am advising the bank / issuer that I do not want to authorize these transactions, it's not on them to say "well, we're here to help them continue to be able to authorize them, not for you to keep your money."
That's an issue between me and the merchant. I don't want MY bank acting as an enabler for the merchant over my wishes, with my money.
You're thinking like an engineer. From the perspective of the bank, you (the individual) has given a merchant (gym etc) a standing authority to bill you. That authority is between you and the merchant, not between your specific card number and their payment processor. Having your card reissued is not a withdrawal of that authority.
Based on the brief detail provided, I think OP's mistake was to cancel/reissue the card rather than dispute the charge / block the merchant.
I used to work at a different bank, and we were able to disable the auto billing update on a card so that when we went to close the card and send one with a new number, no merchants would be notified of the new account. Some workers didn't know this could be done... I'd be surprised if Wells Fargo didn't have a way to turn this off.
For subscriptions, you should use a service like privacy.com or corporate companies like mercury, brex, ramp etc which provides digital cards that you can set limits on.
They also provide ability to pause card after which no transaction would go through.
> Next month, guess what? A bunch of the same charges again
What kind of charges? Did you cancel the subscriptions, disputed them with the bank? Sometimes I read advice to "just cancel the card" instead of proper cancelling a subscription.
Side note: Wells Fargo is a terrible bank, never use them.
Once upon a time, Keybank refused to block a merchant from debiting my account (I can't remember if by card or account number, it was a decade ago), because, they said, "if I hadn't canceled, I had an active subscription". They seemed apathetic to the concept that it wasn't their job to facilitate the merchant's attempt to have payment rendered (if I'm having a hard time canceling a subscription and this is my resort, then that's between me and the merchant. The bank is a neutral party, at worst - ideally they should be supportive of me saying "I don't want this entity to take my money").
Closed my account and moved on.