Originally Posted by Deborah12687
When I purchase anything online I go thru PayPal. I never give my debit or credit card to anyone directly.
Most online store carts use merchant services accounts that hide all the financial details, like card numbers, from the merchant.
On most shopping sites, unless you call the merchant and physically give them the card number and details, they never see those details.
Here's how to tell if the store has access to your financial info; If a store offers to save your cc number, etc in an account file, they usually do have access to your card info. I personally would stay away from stores that do this. I prefer to enter my card info each time. If you use Paypal for your orders, you are saving your financial information on Paypal. (Not that that's a bad thing, Paypal is at least as trustworthy as your bank is.) Some stores, like Amazon and others will save your financial information on their computers and employees there will have access to it. It's up to you whether to trust these stores with your cc information.
If a store doesn't offer to save your cc info, they most likely will never see that info and won't have access to it at any time, if you order online and don't call and give them info.
If a store uses a system where you place an order and then they have someone call you and get your card number, or if they only take phone orders and don't have secure online ordering, or if they encourage you to send your cc information via email, I'd stay away from that store, because they probably don't have appropriate financial protection in place.
On a lot of stores though, like ours, if you establish an account, you'll save only your address information or other shipping info, wish lists, etc, to make it easier to order and track your orders.
We don't save, nor do we want to be responsible for any financial info. If you choose to order via phone, and we take your CC over the phone, like any well-run careful store we put that info immediately into our merchant services computer system, at which point we no longer have access to it. Any handwritten notes taken during order processing are immediately shredded.
If you order using a credit or debit card at stores that don't save your financial information, that information is passed through the merchant services computer directly along to your banking institution and is only maintained in the merchant services computers long enough to service and close the transaction. The merchant (like us) never sees the financial info.
And that's the way we like it... :mrgreen: