Carragee Consulting

Overprotective?

I may have to change to a new bank because of my credit union’s overbearing fraud detection algos.

I have been using Wings Financial Credit Union since it was in my office lobby at Northwest Airlines in 2006. They have lovely human staff who pick up the phone and help with tech issues, mortgages and cashiers checks.

However, Wings also has fraud detection that constantly flags my real purchase attempts and prevents me from accomplishing things I need to do.

In this case I torpedoed my phone and I have been desperately trying to either get the screen fixed or get a new one asap so I can use 2FA to log into VPN.

In another case I was trying to buy gas.

When companies implement these fraud flagging algos they have to weigh the costs of being wrong in both directions, false positives and false negatives.

Missing real fraud and then having to cover the cost of flat screen TV, $300 at Mcdonalds and massive cash withdrawals costs credit card companies a lot of money. Shutting cards down quickly minimizes this.

The false negative’s costs can be minimized by communication like this which enable your user to verify their purchases near real time on the cellphone, except when their cell phone (and new protective case) is the thing they are try desperately to buy.

The opportunity cost of a few days of work while I don’t have a phone and fight Xfinity and now my credit union while I try to procure one is huge (98% of my sanity).Activate to view larger image,