Protecting You and Your Credit

When paying for eBay purchases Paypal offers quite a few options for protecting your financial information. Instead of sending your bank account information or credit card information to every seller, Paypal will transfer money between sellers and buyers. It lets you use both bank transfers and credit cards for payment. Additionally, if you end up in a bad deal with a seller you can dispute the transaction with Paypal and most of the time they will return your money if the seller refuses to cooperate. If you pay using a credit card you can also dispute the charge with your credit card company. A lot of smaller websites use Paypal for payment services also because of the simplicity for online merchants.

         When you’re making purchases through online stores be sure to read their privacy policy closely. You don’t want to do business with a company that doesn’t take your privacy and financial security seriously. Additionally, when entering personal information you should look for the form encryption icon. Every browser is different, but the help section in your browser should be able to explain how to tell if a form is encrypted. Most importantly, never ever enter any private information into a web form that you’re unsure of.

         When making purchases through online vendors or independent websites there’s additional ways to protect your financial information. One service that is particularly helpful is Bill Me Later. Not only does it allow you to only give your financial information to one company instead of many, it lets you defer payment for a short period of time. Hundreds of the top online retailers use their service.

One of the safest ways of protecting your financial information though is using one-time use credit card numbers. A few of the major banks offer this service. Basically you go to their website, they generate a one-time use only credit card number that when used will reference to your real credit card account. I found a great article discussing this very topic on AuctionBytes.com. It explains the concept much better than I could.

One of the best resources for advice on watching your finances and protecting your credit is Clark Howard. Although, I’m pretty sure everybody knows who he is by now. There’s LOTS of information on his website about protecting your identity and your financial information.

Have fun out there, and stay safe!