After years of purchases, with only expiration dates to update here or there, I was taken by surprise when each stated they needed to verify who we were.  I was like ‘What?’ have you not seen my Etsy track record?  Do you not know I have debts to pay?  Who do they think they are doing this to me?  To top all that off, I’m not back home in the states where this could probably be taken care of in a second.

And if you live overseas and decide to use Google Checkout, make sure you have the EXACT information that your foreign bank has or else they will be pounding on your door too wanting this or that verification.  So why blog about this you may wonder, well I simply wanted to give advice on how to prevent such troubled waters and embarassing apologetic e-mails for yet another reason why your payment is so very late.

If you live in the states it would be very easy to handle a matter but why handle it if you could just prepare in advance so you won’t have this problem:

Get copies of all your information you think they might want, for example:

• Copy of your most recent bank statement that reflects your address and you need to be sure that the address matches IDENTICALLY to your ATM/DEBIT Card and/or Credit Card. EXACTLY identical.
• Copy of your most recent Utility Statement and Phone Bill that reflects the correct address of your Bank Information.  Again, make sure it’s exact.
• Copy of your Passport (mostly for those of us outside the US, this is such a valuable tool to have for anything really since you have to provide so much proof of who you are before you even get a passport)
• Copy of your state drivers liscence.  (I even had that and it still was not enough)
• Copy of your resident card if you are a legal resident in the US, another valuable piece of identification.
• Or a copy of any other Government type Identification that has your photo on it.

I think that about covers it for now.  Really, I highly advise anyone, whether you are overseas or stateside, it could not hurt to just head them off at the pass before you get surprised one day and find yourself waiting 4 to 5 business days so they can ‘verify’ who you are.

Another preparation would be to let the bank note your account that you make certain ‘frequent’ purchases online and which stores you are mostly likely to be purchasing from.  If you do this in advance, you won’t have happen to you what happened to me.  Going into a shop in Verdun, here in Beirut, a shop I frequent, my usual card would not work so when I tried subsequent cards, they got blocked because of ‘unusual’ activity.  And that card that I had been using exclusively was blocked for the same reason with just one swipe.

I really don’t get it.  Anyhow, lesson here is to just be prepared.  It can’t hurt to just let them know where you will be purchasing from, especially online.  And letting them know how long you plan to be in a foreign country and the like.  Yeah, they even wanted to know when I expected to return from abroad if you could imagine that one.

Though I do love the security measures they have taken to protect me, it just would have been nice for them to warn me so I didn’t make promises I did not know I could not keep right away.  And always communicate with those you owe a debt too.  A small e-mail keeping the seller or institution you need to pay informed every step of the way goes a long way in my book.  Its better than them trying to ‘guess’ what is going on and the e-mail will be appreciated even though you feel utterly embarassed to have to write to them with what seems to be an excuse.  Doing this, you usually find out how sweet and understanding most people are and even banks and credit companies are understanding (to a point for the credit guys).

Be Prepared!  Now where have I heard that before?