Tangerine Cash Back MasterCard | Credit card reward programs | Discussion forum

I've had several different recurring payments billed to my Tangerine CC over the years not coded as such and only earned 0.5% instead of 2%.

I finally ditched my Tangerine CC and bank account in retaliation after they charged me around a 40.00 NSF fee to my Tangerine account when I had 1.13 charged to it from a freephoneline account I wasn't using and had forgotten about. I had no money in the Tangerine account at the time, and had the account setting to automatically pay off the CC bill.

Alexandra said
With my card I am supposed to get 2% cash back on Groceries & Home Improvements. The rest is at .5%.

Last March I purchased several items at Home Depot and received the 2%. But yesterday I purchased nearly $3K worth of lumber at Home Depot and I see they have the purchase under "Home Decor, Furniture and Appliances" instead of "Home Improvement". It is still under "pending" but does have that category attached.
I called Tangerine and they said there is nothing they can do about it.  

I think it is store that sets categories. Example: Walmart Superstore near me puts everything in Groceries category. Even if I buy just socks there, I am getting 2% cash back from Tangerine Groceries category. People on this forum said before that not all Superstores do that.
If you plan to shop often at that Home Depot, you may wish to discuss this topic with the store manager.
It is also possible, if your Home Depot similar to mine, they have two sets of cash registers: one for people buying stuff they can easily carry, and another near lumber section for large size and heavy purchases. Maybe, these two sets of registers are configured with different categories.

Merchant Category Code (MCC) is set by the card network and not by the merchant.

Each card network (Mastercard, Visa, AMEX, Discover, ...) has a set of rules that is applied to determine the MCC. If a merchant wishs to have one of the grocery store codes, then the merchant needs to make the business meet the definition for a grocery store.

The MCC is assigned to each card terminal and has nothing to do with what is purchased. Car polish and washer fluid purchased from a Loblaws store is a grocery store purchase because the merchant is a grocery store and not because the items purchased are somehow groceries.

Card issuers, like Tangerine Bank, won't get involved in MCC disputes. It is unfortunate for cardholders if a merchant is really a grocery store that sells some furniture but is not really a furniture store as far as the rules are concerned.