Students and residents of Boone can rest easier when using
their credit cards in area restaurants. As of June 9, 2003,
the North Carolina General Assembly ratified a bill making
it illegal for restaurants to print entire credit card numbers
on receipts.
According to the North Carolina General Assembly’s
Web site, the bill will be completely in place by July 1,
2005.
With this new law in place restaurants will no longer be
allowed to print more than five digits of a credit, debit
or charge account number, nor will they be allowed to print
the card’s expiration date.
“This law is great for the consumer, it doesn’t
make a difference for us here at the restaurant, but since
the law has come about, I have had three people come up and
ask me why our slips still print the whole number,”
said Mike Bose, general manager of Macado’s, on King
Street.
“I just explained to them that we have a while before
we have to be in full compliance with the law and that we
are working on it,” Bose said.
Bose said the change should take place quickly.
“We
have one person who will reprogram the computers from his
house. It should only take about ten minutes, and we will
be in compliance,” Bose said.
Some students said they feel this is a great improvement
and hope that the process is a fast one.
“I work in a restaurant and I know how upset people
get when they see their whole account number on a receipt,”
said Joseph T. Hellinger, a senior at Appalachian State University.
“Credit card slips can get thrown away or misplaced,
and then someone else can get your credit card number. All
the information you would need to make an online purchase
is right on most receipts. I am really glad that they are
making this illegal because it really is unfair to consumers
to have all their information out their like that,”
Hellinger said.
This new law is part of several new laws North Carolina is
enacting to counter-act identity theft. According to the
101 identity theft Web site, the number one type of identity
theft in North Carolina is credit card fraud.
This accounts for 44 percent of all cases of identity theft
in North Carolina.
According to the United States Department of Justice Web
site, there are many things a person can do to prevent becoming
victims of identity theft.
The Department of Justice recommends that everyone carefully
check their credit card statements each month to make sure
they recognize everything on the statement.
Also, people should never give out information to people
who call them claiming to be from their bank, but need information
that they should already have on file.
The North Carolina General Attorney, Roy Cooper’s Web
site also gives hints on how to protect you from fraud.
According to Cooper’s Web site, people should shred
all documents that have confidential information before throwing
them away.
The Web site also recommends that people should mail their
bills at the post office instead of from their house because
people can remove things from your mailbox.
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