when American Express stopped processing porn ?
 

when American Express stopped processing internet porn and what were the exact reasons for it ?

anyone remember ?

( it seems like I am to much afraid about the VISA rules and the idea what further steps they could take, but hey, I really don't want to be an EU official ! )

I think it was around July 2000 that American Express stopped processing for adult.

Posted
03:00 AM May. 26, 2000 PT

http://www.techtv.com/cybercrime/vic...003132,00.html

Andre

I remember reading at the time that their reasons for not processing adult anymore were because of excessively high chargebacks in the industry.

OH BTW the exact date they stopped was

Since May 1, American Express has been rolling out a new policy: It will no longer cover transactions from adult Web sites. American Express spokeswoman Joanne Fisher said the credit card company has just begun the process of notifying their merchant clients of the decision.


Andre

was there a max. cb rate like 2.5% or 5% before they stopped ?

they said:

"We worked with merchants in the adult content industry for about a year and looked at various ways that we could bring down the customer dispute rates," she argues. "When the rates did not come down, we made the decision to have an industry-wide policy."

Visa is also "working with merchants" and trying to "bring down the customer dispute rates"now ...:(

supposedly there are discussions going on with them to bring them back into adult processing.

that's good news :thumbsup

This is just another reason why we need alternative payment methods. When your credit card company won't let you charge online gambling fees to your card, you go through Netteller or another third party service. We need an internet-wide standard third party financial solution for people who want to join our adult sites.

SpaceAce

they stopped years ago. their risk management simply was not able to control the adult portfolio.

In other words adult companies ripped the surfer off, Amex had to handle too many chargebacks and decided it's not worth it. Seen that before :)

Their card number sequences were just too easy to manipulate. Adult just happens to be the thing that pays so of course it was a problem.

You know, I thought about doing this at one time. Then I remembered how much I despise paperwork and actually working so I changed my mind.

Yeah good point, but Visa won't be an option soon, so adult will have to look at other avenues. I know of 5 companies which are working on their own 'secret not to be told to anyone' processors to get around the visa regs. It's a true quality of the adult industry that we all see bad times as an opportunity for profit :)

I've been saying that for a while now.

I joined Party Poker the other day and they let me use ePassporte.

ARS is unveiling theirs soon. Its a variant of the micropayment dialer model.

Is there a model that does not use the rebill method at all?

That doesn't surprize me at all. Fucking stupid decision based on short term woes. Every day that goes by and they arn't involved makes it harder for them to become one of the de-facto standard cards for online purchases. Too many surfers buy porn who also buy non-adult stuff off the web for it not to hurt them in the long run.

That, incidentally, is why I think the doom mongers who say VISA will just pack up adult processing are wrong. I have no special insight or secret knowledge about this :) I just think online non-adult purchases per se are going to sky rocket over the coming years. It would be a very stupid, short sighted credit card company who didn't want their card to at least have a chance of being 'the online card'. And 'the online card' must include being able to buy porn which is what ? 70% of all online purchases currently ?. I know when I buy online, for example, my recent online purchase of a lawnmower, I didn't even consider the amex. It just stays at the back of me wallet mouldering now since I can't buy content with it.

Otto, Andrew Edmonds and myself did a TV show and article for Cybercrime - TechTV in 2000 regarding Amex and their decision.

You can read it here:

http://www.techtv.com/cybercrime/vic...003240,00.html

and here:

http://www.techtv.com/cybercrime/vic...003132,00.html

I have been speaking with exec at Amex about maybe allowing some merchants with thier own accounts and low chargebakcs to process again but we have not settled on anything yet.

Mitch

:thumbsup