Best/Safest Card to Use at Gas Pump?

[seattlecredit08]

(Mod Edit) ...what are the best / safest credit cards to use at the pump.

I had my credit card stolen at the gas pump (so called "credit card skimming") about a month ago (2nd time in the last year).

The second time this happened, I had $3000+ unauthorized charges in less than a day, with 2 one-way airline tickets purchased (this is the first time I have seen that, usually it's just random purchases). But I digress..

In any case, credit card claim resolution was easy, that's not the issue. The problem was how the credit card issuer handled credit reporting post resolution. The original tradeline was marked closed with "Lost/Stolen" notation, and they started a new one, backdating it. The problem, of course, with this approach is that this impacted by Average Age of Accounts (AAofA).

So perhaps my question is two-fold:

1. Are there any credit cards that are inherently safer to use for gas?
2. Are there known big issuers (e.g. AMEX) which treat Lost/Stolen cards differently than above and do not create two tradelines on the credit report when the card is reported stolen?

Thanks in advance!!

[SunriseEarth]

OP, I have created a new topic based on your post in another topic.   Your headline has been edited to clarify your question better.

--SE

[SunriseEarth]

I've had two instances with compromised cards, one with my Discover and the other with my US Bank Cash+.   With Discover, charges were made but i was credited for the amounts until the account was closed.  Upon closure, the amounts were waived per their fraud protection.  I was issued a new number and the new reporting replaced the old reporting on all CRs.  For US Bank, I was notified of potential fraudulent use, so the card was cancelled and reissued before I saw any pending transactions.   Similarly to Discover, I was issued a new account number and my new reporting replaced my old reporting.  

I should note that neither card was compromised at the gas pump.  Discover appeared to be compromised after an online purchase, but I'm not sure about the US Bank card.   The only time I was every skimmed at a gas pump was long long ago at an AM/PM when I had to use a debit card (gasp!).   That was caught quickly, but could have been much worse.  I have not used debit at a gas station ever since.  

[Gmood1]

I've had several stolen card numbers and replacements. In the end, it really doesn't matter if they create another account.
Normally within a year the duplicate will disappear from your reports.
Chase, Amex, USAA and Citi will just reissue another card with new account numbers.
FNBO and Synchrony will generate a completely separate account.
The impact to scores if any, is so minimal. It's not worth losing sleep over.

[HeavenOhio]

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@Gmood1 wrote:
Chase, Amex, USAA and Citi will just reissue another card with new account numbers.
FNBO and Synchrony will generate a completely separate account.
The impact to scores if any, is so minimal. It's not worth losing sleep over.

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Capital One and Barclays will also simply reissue the card without anything funky on the credit report.

I have a duplicate account on my report right now (for a completely different reason). On my relatively thin file, it makes a six-week spree look worse than it actually is. And the duplicate account also affected my 5/24 status, but that's in the past now.

As far as safety, all magnetic stripes are vulnerable, so one bank vs. another won't really help that way.

[DaveInAZ]

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@Gmood1 wrote:
I've had several stolen card numbers and replacements. In the end, it really doesn't matter if they create another account.
Normally within a year the duplicate will disappear from your reports.
Chase, Amex, USAA and Citi will just reissue another card with new account numbers.
FNBO and Synchrony will generate a completely separate account.
The impact to scores if any, is so minimal. It's not worth losing sleep over.

---

Yeah, I misplaced my Walmart store card last year and the new account shows on my open accounts with the original opening date of 2013, so no ding for a new account while the old account shows up on my closed accounts with the 2013 date which actually helps my AAoA. I have a 2010 BK 7 so most of my accounts are fairly new. 

As for gas stations all the ones I use still use swipe instead of chip, so they're all vulnerable to skimmers. I use my BoA Cash Rewards for 3% rewards for gas and with the BoA mobile app I get purchase alerts so I'll catch on pretty quick if it gets compromised.

[longtimelurker]

Re safety: I would guess others have something similar, but for Exxon-Mobil I use their Speedpass+ app which allows payment through a mobile wallet (on Samsung anyway).    So everything is tokenized which (hopefully!) defeats skimming

[K-in-Boston]

I have been using Chase Pay for nearly every fuel purchase since gas stations and/or Chase Pay have been 5% categories on Chase Freedom for a while now.  For Shell, this works great since I just load up the Chase Pay app, touch Gas, confirm that I'm at the station it thinks I'm at, enter the pump number and all I have to do is get out of the car and punch in a 3-digit number into the pump (which also put in my Fuel Rewards number).  Fuel isn't a huge expense for me, but my car requires 93 octane so I'm usually getting back about $3 worth of UR points from Chase on top of saving around $4.50 on the tank from Fuel Rewards.

If I'm unable to use Chase Pay these days, I'll use my Citi Premier for 3x TYPs.  Compromised cards don't worry me too much, though.  I've had it happen with Amex a few times and they were great.  Had it happen with US Bank and while they took care of me fine, there was an issue with the fact that I had just put a very large balance transfer on the card and when they issued me the new card it had a new account number.  The original card stayed on my Equifax report (with that huge balance and very low account age) along with the replacement card for months and months, until I finally had to do a CFPB complaint which promptly got the original account removed.

[longtimelurker]

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@K-in-Boston wrote:

I have been using Chase Pay for nearly every fuel purchase since gas stations and/or Chase Pay have been 5% categories on Chase Freedom for a while now.  For Shell, this works great since I just load up the Chase Pay app, touch Gas, confirm that I'm at the station it thinks I'm at, enter the pump number and all I have to do is get out of the car and punch in a 3-digit number into the pump (which also put in my Fuel Rewards number). 

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Speedpass + doesn't require anything to be entered at the pump, just authorizes in the app.  Wonder why the difference.

[Pikaboo-icu]

Perhaps the more pertinent question is: The safest gas pump to use your card.

Any card can be compromised, hopefully your card choice will have great fraud protection & customer service.

I'm super picky about where I buy gas to begin with- my husband on the other hand.... 

We haven't been victims of anything related to gas purchases but I have had fraudulent charges appear from who-knows-what.

I think it may have been an online purchase but that's going off topic.. 

The sooner they get tap & pay enabled everywhere, the better.