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Credit card activation: security or reverse marketing?

So I received two new Discover cards, with supposed enhanced security features. I didn’t ask for them, they just sent them to me. I got a new account number which is a pain because various merchants directly bill my credit card and they will have to be updated, by me.

You know the little stickers on the credit cards, call xxx-xxx-xxxx to activate your credit card? Do they actually do anything or add to security? Would the card not work if I didn’t call the number?

Well the nice lady who got on the line to activate my card promptly switched scripts and (after thanking me for being a customer for sooo long) promptly started selling me something.

How annoying. Tricked me into calling them to get their sales pitch.

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 23rd, 2008 at 2:59 pm and is filed under Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Credit card activation: security or reverse marketing?”

  1. Jason Butler Says:
    July 25th, 2008 at 8:36 am

    Discover is awful about this.

    They have to “wait while the activation is being processed.” I got 8 seconds into the spiel and asked if we were done yet. Then, they let me off.

    Pretty annoying, though.

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