No, a merchant can't discriminate by sub-cards within a network - that's a great way to get kicked out of the network and never be able to charge a visa again.
The network may disallow the behavior but networks are slow to regulate and in theory are consumer focused.
That's true, however whoever provided you with the card is responsible for ensuring you are not misusing it.
I once had a trial with a company and added my Privacy.com card that would expire in a day. I've canceled that trial and forgot about it. Then some time later I had to use the same company, but I've totally forgotten that I had an account with them (I've also changed the email I use). Anyways, privacy.com suspended my account because using their cards to get trials over and over again is against their ToS.
A merchant can't discriminate, but the payment processor, credit card network, or issuer can under several conditions including "an immediate fraud threat." Virtual credit cards being used to violate contracts could very well be considered to be a fraud threat.
Could you link to something backing up what you are saying? I'm curious about the facts of the matter, and also why a comment like yours (factually correct or incorrect it is pretty innocuous) appears downvoted.
Much obliged! I can see what the original person was referring to, but that segment (and thank you for such a lovely and specific reference) includes enough caveats in limited space that I'm not confident my reading is correct.
Doesn’t Google (Cloud and Ads) discriminate against “privacy” and “virtual” card numbers? I feel like I’ve heard of that being an issue with Apple Card and Privacy.com on here in the past.
Google will never actually give you a stated reason for account closure, people have just deduced that it's privacy cards that are getting closed. So yeah even if it's against terms-of-service (based on what's been said here) they're smart enough not to just say it.
Your only recourse would be filing a complaint with Visa, and hoping they investigate, but "google closed my account" is not gonna be something that's super high on their priority list to investigate, I'm guessing.
That I don't know about and that could be allowed depending on the network. I know Privacy.com has restrictions on their side (you can't use their cards on some porn sites for instance) but that would be the issuer doing the limiting which is almost always allowed.
The network may disallow the behavior but networks are slow to regulate and in theory are consumer focused.