5 replies to this topic

[Chris Miller]

I was asked today "What kind of card is it" from a supplier who I had just given my MasterCard number to. It dawned on me that perhaps not everyone knows how credit cards are numbered, or how to tell them apart. So I thought I would post this little "how to" for others to use.

These are some of the better known issuer identifiers, along with card length for each.

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American Express
Starts with: 34,37
Card Number Length: 15
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VISA
Starts with: 4
Card Number Length: 13,16
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MasterCard
Starts with: 51-55
Card Number Length: 16
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Discover
Starts with: 6011. 622126-622925, 644-649, 65
Card Number Length: 16
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[royhill]

And that is why you get paid the big bucks :D.

Seriously thanks for the info, knew there was a 'code" but didn't know it was the 1st couple of numbers.

[jenzimm]

It's actually even a bit easier than that. Just the first number is all you need.

Amex is 3
Visa is 4
MC is 5
Discover is 6

[Chris Miller]

jenzimm said:

It's actually even a bit easier than that. Just the first number is all you need.

Amex is 3
Visa is 4
MC is 5
Discover is 6

Somewhat... there are diners club cards that start with 3 and 5, the international "bankcard" starts with 5, etc. There are actually a lot of variables.

Anyone interested in more info could check out the following article on Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia....ank_card_number

[Allan]

Why does it matter? My CC machine takes them all and spits out cash (well, actually virtual money since it is in my bank account after a couple of days.:D).

[margie@kapcoadv.com]

There are Visa cards with 13 digits? I did not know that.