American Express Members Banned From Online Porn

Sydney Morning Herald

Saturday November 11, 2000

Sherrill Nixon

American Express has banned the use of its credit cards on porn Web sites because so many people disputed the charges when they received their bills.

The credit card company spent a year working with the online adult entertainment industry in a bid to reduce the rate at which customers denied they had used their credit card for Internet porn.

``This was a business decision based on the unacceptably high levels of customer disputes in this industry," an American Express spokeswoman, Ms Suzie York, said.

``After evaluating the industry for over a year and working closely with merchants, customer dispute levels were still not reduced and therefore, we made the decision to no longer allow card acceptance."

Online porn poses a particular problem for credit card companies because the usual method of resolving a dispute proof of delivery does not apply when a person pays to view a site.

Neither MasterCard nor Visa has taken such drastic measures over the use of their credit cards for adult Web sites.

A spokesperson for MasterCard said about 20 companies across the world including a small number from Australia were named on a MasterCard blacklist because customers continually challenged their bills. Meanwhile, Visa is working on new ways to secure transactions on the Internet.

The latest figures from Nielsen/NetRatings show nearly 521,000 Australians accessed adult Web sites from home over the past four weeks.

© 2000 Sydney Morning Herald

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