Shopping online is a great way to save money, and it’s way more convenient than shopping in person. You can get some wonderful bargains doing your shopping online, and there’s no traffic to fight, no parking spaces to search for and no crowds to fend off at the shopping mall. But some people worry about the security of online shopping. After all, you need to type in your credit card number when you make an online purchase, and having to do that makes some people very nervous.
Never fear. If this does describe you then here is a safer way to shop online. You can use a virtual credit card in place of your regular card. Some large banks, including Discover, Citi and MBNA offer this service to their customers to use in place of their regular plastic credit cards. PayPal is another payment service using virtual payments and is also safe and secure.
To start using a virtual credit card is easy and can make a big difference in how you feel about the level of security when shopping online. The numbers on a virtual credit card are randomly selected d by a computer. This type of credit card is often called a substitute credit card. Their design is to provide peace of mind to those who worry about identity theft and fraudulent use of their plastic credit cards.No extra charge is involved with the use of virtual credit cards and they do protect your real credit card numbers from fraudulent use by others.
Each bank or company that offers virtual credit cards uses a slightly different procedure, but the principle behind them is basically the same. Credit card users sign up for the virtual credit card program at their credit card’s website, and often download some software from that website. The downloaded software is used to randomly generate the user’s substitute credit card numbers. When virtual credit card users are ready to buy online, they enter the virtual credit card number that’s generated into the online shop’s website, not their real card number. The only people who know the real credit card number is the user and his or her bank or credit card company. The online seller has no access to that information, so there’s no possibility of misuse or fraud.
This form of payment, the virtual credit card, can be used to purchase over the telephone or even through the mail. The virtual card can be used for almost any type of shopping, not just online. And any purchase that is in-person purchase is the only time a plastic card is required.
If you’re a credit card user that’s concerned about credit card fraud or identity theft, consider signing up for a virtual credit card. It’s easy, free, and accepted as payment when you’re shopping on the internet, on the telephone or through the mail. Taking that step to sign up to use substitute credit card numbers is a very small price to pay for such a large amount of protection and security.
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