Credit card expiration dates - Inclusive or exclusive

Question

Say you ve got a credit card number with an expiration date of 05 08 - i e  May 2008   Does that mean the card expires on the morning of the 1st of May 2008  or the night of the 31st of May 2008

User · Accepted Answer

It took me a couple of minutes to find a site that I could source for this.

The card is valid until the last day of the month indicated, after the last [sic]¹ day of the next month; the card cannot be used to make a purchase if the merchant attempts to obtain an authorization. - Source

Also, while looking this up, I found an interesting article on Microsoft's website using an example like this, exec summary: Access 2000 for a month/year defaults to the first day of the month, here's how to override that to calculate the end of the month like you'd want for a credit card.

Additionally, this page has everything you ever wanted to know about credit cards.

This is assumed to be a typo and that it should read "..., after the first day of the next month; ..."

User · Answer

lots of big companies dont even use your expiration date anymore because it causes auto-renewal of payments to be lost when cards are issued with new expiration dates and the same account number   This has been a huge problem in the service industry  so these companies have cornered the card issuers into processing payments w o expiration dates to avoid this pitfall   Not many people know about this yet  so not all companies use this practice

User · Answer

In my experience  it has expired at the end of that month   That is based on the fact that I can use it during that month  and that month is when my bank sends a new one

User · Answer

In your example a credit card is expired on 6 2008   Without knowing what you are doing I cannot say definitively you should not be validating ahead of time but be aware that sometimes business rules defy all logic   For example  where I used to work they often did not process a card at all or would continue on transaction failure simply so they could contact the customer and get a different card

User · Answer

I process a lot of credit card transaction at work  and I can tell you that the expiry date is inclusive    Also  I agree with Gorgapor  Don t write your own processing code  They are some good tools out there for credit card processing  Here we have been using Monetra for 3 years and it does a pretty decent job at it

User · Answer

According to Visa s  Card Acceptance and Chargeback Management Guidelines for Visa Merchants    Good Thru   or  Valid Thru   Date is the expiration date of the card      A card is valid through the last day of the month shown   e  g    if   the Good Thru date is 03 12 the card is valid through March 31  2012   and expires on April 1  2012      It is located below the embossed account number  If the current transaction date is after the  Good Thru  date  the card has expired

User · Answer

If you are writing a site which takes credit card numbers for payment    You should probably be as permissive as possible  so that if it does expire  you allow the credit card company to catch it  So  allow it until the last second of the last day of the month  Don t write your own credit card processing code  If H HWhen you write a bug  someone will lose real money  We all make mistakes  just don t make decisions that turn your mistakes into catastrophes

User · Answer

Have a look on one of your own credit cards   It ll have some text like EXPIRES END or VALID THRU above the date   So the card expires at the end of the given month

User · Answer

I had a Automated Billing setup online and the credit card said it say good Thru 10 09  but the card was rejected the first week in October and again the next week  Each time it was rejected it cost me a  10 fee  Don t assume it good thru the end of the month if you have automatic billing setup

User · Answer

How do time zones factor in this analysis   Does a card expire in New York before California   Does it depend on the billing or shipping addresses

[e-commerce] Credit card expiration dates - Inclusive or exclusive?

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