Credit Card - Not Authorized?!

Well , hello.. i m trying the last days to update my Credit Card info without any success.
Cant figure what the prob is, i billed this credit card in the past too. i keep getting the message "not authorized".. well if anyone has an idea of what to do, i ll appreciate it..

I suggest you phone your credit card company and ask them if they have refused to make the transaction. There are problems with some of them having LL on the fraud risk list.

Did you update your credit card numbers and info on the main http://www.secondlife.com website? You go to the main site, click on my account, to the right find the link that says Update Payment Method (under membership), then press the button that says Delete and Update Credit Card Info, put in your real name and card info in there. It often takes a few minutes (3-5) for it to update, and then you can buy Lindens in world using the Lindex button.

If this doesn't work for you, try filling out a ticket by clicking the support button on the main page. You can also try call the billing department at 1-800-294-1067 (toll free), open 24/7.

Happened to me many times. When the CC company fails to authorise a payment, Linden Lab's merchant then blocks subsequent payments automatically so it has to be resolved a specific way.

First, contact the CC company and tell them to authorise the next transaction charged under the name of "Second Life".

Second, raise a ticket pointing out what happened. A Linden will ensure further CC transactions under your name are no longer blocked.

Third, delete and re-enter CC info. (The Linden responding your ticket will usually tell you to do this.)

Annoying huh?

AFAIK it's charged as Linden Lab, you know ..... the pharmacy in Britain?

Yeah they probably think it's your drug dealer…

…which in a way it is

Well CC company dont have a reason to cancel this transaction - i made transactions with LL and the same CC company in the past.
So i only guess its LL prob.

Not on mine. I remember the Indian call centre guy saying "Linden Labia? Linden Labia? There no Linden Labia here!"

It's billed as "Second Life 800-860-6990".

Nope. My CC company has no reason *not* to authorize my LL transactions either, but fact is, many of them consider LL a risk.

I've been buying Lindens, paying tier, etc., since May 2006, but for some reason since the middle of summer 2007 I've had problem after problem using my credit card with LL. I now have to ring my CC company on the 13th of every month to ensure my tier is paid on the 14th. I've had the card since 1996, I use it regularly for other transactions (when out shopping in real life, for online goods, etc.) and that's never a problem in the slightest.

Using the same card or that many years?? Shouldn't you have gotten a new one by now?

I have a number of credit cards. When I say "I've had this credit card for x number of years", I mean a CC account with that particular company. They replace the physical card every three/four years. That's quite usual.

This just happened to me as well. Visa will not "fund" gaming sites any longer. My card had been on file and I had no problems. When the card was due to expire and the replacement card arrived I updated my info and it would not authorize. A real pain. I just had to attach LL to my paypal account and all was good again. Still a real pain though.

Whoever told you Visa will no longer fund gaming sites is not telling the truth. If your CC company told you this, file a complaint and demand they authorise the payment. This is a Linden Lab specific issue. Credit card companies just don't trust them. It's as simple as that.

I can actually use my VISA and Visa Electron cards with LL fine. It's a card underwritten by another company that presents a problem, but I choose to use that because the APR is much, much lower, and they don't charge me for currency conversion (unlike my Visa cards).

Linden Labs is also the name of a farmecy here in the UK,lol

they proberly think ur trying to buy dugs or something

Well did all the things you suggested
Let me say that my CC is new ! Less than 6months.
I contact my bank and they said the prob is not theirs. They didnt "stop" any transactions.
I also write a ticket to LL... but i dont believe to an immediate answer
The last solution.. i ll create a paypal account , hoping this probs would solve!
-I m not in the UK, so no drug deals for me -

I have a question: is it a corporate or government card? because if it is, then they will only authorize purchases with it if the SIC code(s) allowed on the card match the SIC code(s) of the purchace type.
However, if it is a debit or credit card for consummers, then you shuold be able to consume away! ask your card issuing institution for a list of SIC coded purchaces allowed on the card, and then ask LL for the SIC code they are using for thier clients purchacing from them. If you do not find the same number in both lists, then there would be the culprit. ask your bank to issue a new card with all the codes.

Then again, I could be way off here, not knowing the situation. It could be that the address associated with the card is not what you are inputting in the form at the SL website checkout... Did you move since you were issued the card, and not update your card to reflect your address? Are you inputting the card's CCV code as well?

I have a question: is it a corporate or government card? Because if it is, then they will only authorize purchases with it if the SIC code(s) allowed on the card match the SIC code(s) of the purchase type.
However, if it is a debit or credit card for consumers, then you should be able to consume away! Ask your card issuing institution for a list of SIC coded purchases allowed on the card, and then ask LL for the SIC code they are using for their clients purchasing from them. If you do not find the same number in both lists, then there would be the culprit. Ask your bank to issue a new card with all the codes.

Then again, I could be way off here, not knowing the situation. It could be that the address associated with the card is not what you are inputting in the form at the SL website checkout... Did you move since you were issued the card, and not update your card to reflect your address? Are you inputting the card's CCV code as well?

Interesting...the fact of the matter is, Visa or MasterCard will honor an agreement between a vendor (Second Life/Linden Labs) and their merchant processing company (including the payment gateway) and First Data (back office processing) as long as they adhere to the merchant processor's underwriting criteria, and the merchant processor adheres to V/MC criteria as well. It has NOTHING to do with Visa or the Card issuing bank rejecting transaction types. If a particular merchant processing company is not willing to underwrite certain business types (I.E. Gambling) then there are several out there that do, but at a much higher percent taken due to the risk. As you can see there are MILLIONS who are successful in their transactions with SL/LL, and a lot of those use Visa.

Millions? Seriously *tries not to giggle*

the issue is trhee fold:

fraud detection at CC flags LL now because they bank in UK, so it's a foreign transaction with a company who'se base name includes "Lab"... this is seen as overseas drug transactions which the US in particular harrasses CC companies about non-stop...
Solution: inform them that LL is a IT company, and to authorise future payments

fraud detection at CC ALSO flags gaming companies, because there is a higher incidence of fraudulent use of cc's to pay for these. They shouldn't flag you if you've been using it for awhile, but occasionally they do.
Solution: same as above, if they balk, tell them you'll just take your business elsewhere, and some other company can reap the benefit... usually shuts em up right quick, can't have customers complaining about not being able to use their card at a merchant that accepts them, gives them a bad reputation.

LL has it's own fraud prevention scheme, that quits billing rejected payment methods, so they don't lose money, and as an aside prevents repeat theft/abuse complaints from CC companies and users alike.
Solution: after straitening things out w/ the CC company, let LL know, and they will usually reinstate, requiring only that you re-enter the info, basically as a way to prove you do in fact have the card info, and it wasn't some sort of "theft by loan"

Hi Graphicguru. You need to research this issue a little more. Fact is, CC rejections suddenly became a major issue for a number of LL's users around June 2007. People have even been locked out of their accounts when their tier failed to be collected because a CC company didn't authorise the payment. This is not the only forum where this issue has cropped up again and again either. We can only speculate as to why it's happening, but it probably has something to do with the amount of fraudulent activity $L trading attracts, the number of chargebacks that consequently occur and the risk certain finance companies are now associating with Linden Lab. On the other hand, maybe it's because my CC details were compromised during the infamous September 2006 server hack which affected the data of thousands of users? This particular credit card (and number) was replaced as a result of that incident at that time. But I still use it because it happens to have a very competitive rate (it's an AMEX, but it ain't one of those high APR, ten-a-penny, Blue cards).

WRONG. Well, WRONG if you're suggesting they're not blocking some payments on the basis they're Second Life related. American Express has rejected everything from $L transactions to tier payments on my account and have admitted such over the phone. That is why they have *instructed* me to ring their *authorisations* dept in advance. I've filed a complaint about this because as far as I'm concerned, I shouldn't have to call them month after month to authorise a regular payment of a fixed amount to the same company. But that's credit card companies for you.

As for my credit card issuer rejecting Second Life transactions, even Linden Lab itself can see this is happening. Response from my most recent support ticket (there are many):



That was August 20th. An SL related transaction was previously rejected on August 14th. And before that, on July 28th.

Yet looking at my July/August statements right now, I can see transactions involving Sony Ericsson's E-Shop, Virgin Mobile, Sainsbury's, John Lewis, Amazon.co.uk, and many payments to my local petrol station all went through during July/August without issue. Not only that, but many of those transactions involved much greater sums than the Linden Lab ones. I also have an unused credit buffer of a few thousand pounds so there's no chance hitting my limit caused a rejection.

American Express don't seem to understand *why* Second Life transactions are such a problem, but they do understand that those particular transactions *are* a problem, hence their advice to call on the 13th of every month to ensure my tier transaction goes through. Hopefully my formal complaint to AMEX will reveal the reason for the rejections.

How lond it takes to reply you to a ticket ?! I guess from Monday or something ?:/

The last tickets I raised were in August and as you can see were related to billing issues. Not sure if that gives them priority, but they were all answered within a couple of hours. Middle of the night pacific time too. I was impressed with the turnaround.

Well it's been a whole day and i already called my CC company 4times.
When you work with L$ gets pretty hard to not have em do your things.

Got a premium account? I think you're supposed to get priority if you have. Hopefully they've answered your ticket by now though.