3rd party cookies

[daryl66]

I am sure this must be a topic covered here someplace however I cannot seem to locate it.

This morning when attempting to belly up to the bar and pay some bills with my banks 'Bill Paying Service", I could not access their bill paying page in either Safari 5.1.4 nor Firefox 8.0.1.  A phone call to my local bank's IT folks revealed that 3rd party cookies must be enabled for this service to work. (They must have made the change cause I have been using this service for a long time)

When I indicated this was not an acceptable situation (the reason being pretty obvious to me at least)    she advised that I could/should turn off the 3rd party cookie button when finished with the bank, and turn it back on the next time I wanted to use the bill paying offering.

I have  Safari Cookie Manager installed but cannot figure out how to get it Safari to accept this one 3rd party cookie and no others.  There is a way isn't there??  

Daryl

[jchuzi]

Two questions:

1. Which bank is doing this?
2. Why are you continuing to patronize them? If this happened to me, I would close out my account so fast that their servers would be smoking.

[Paddy]

Judging from a quick search online, this isn't all that unusual a requirement from US banks. So far, I haven't seen it here in Canada, and I'll be rather annoyed if TDCanada Trust get any bright ideas.

It's unclear as to whether their bill-paying apps require third party cookies (ie: not hosted on the bank's servers?) or whether this is third party tracking for which the bank has contracted out. Either way, for those of us who prefer not to be tracked by anyone and everyone, this poses a problem. I don't see any way of making Safari/Cookie Manager only accept 3rd party cookies for one site - someone asked exactly this on the Apple forums a while ago and there was no way to do it.

Here's what I'd suggest:

1. Use Firefox for the banking site - you can fill in exceptions in the privacy settings which should do the trick. To figure out which exceptions you'll need to fill in, clear all your cookies, change the settings to accept 3rd party cookies, then go to your bank's online bill pay section and then check to see which cookies have been added. Add those to the exceptions list. I think that should do it.
2. Send an email and/or snail mail to your bank - preferably someone higher up - to complain about this ridiculous policy! Clearly, your bank has changed their online billing app to use a third party cookie (because the actual app isn't hosted on the bank's servers?) or contracted with some outside source for tracking purposes or something similar. Whatever they're doing, it's a change from previous policies and they should, at the very least, be required to provide you with an explanation. I wouldn't expect a miraculous change in policy/practice though - as I noted, this doesn't appear to be unusual for US banks.

[daryl66]

QUOTE(jchuzi @ Apr 2 2012, 02:02 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Two questions:

1. Which bank is doing this?
2. Why are you continuing to patronize them? If this happened to me, I would close out my account so fast that their servers would be smoking.

Jon:

 It is Washington Trust Bank, a regional (WA ID OR).  I have done what Paddy suggested and written the Pres and the CEO ( not expecting much) and have begun shopping for another bank.

[jchuzi]

If and when you find another bank, be sure to tell the powers-that-be at Washington Trust Bank exactly why you pulled your account.

[daryl66]

QUOTE(Paddy @ Apr 2 2012, 02:34 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>

.
2. Send an email and/or snail mail to your bank - preferably someone higher up - to complain about this ridiculous policy! Clearly, your bank has changed their online billing app to use a third party cookie (because the actual app isn't hosted on the bank's servers?) or contracted with some outside source for tracking purposes or something similar. Whatever they're doing, it's a change from previous policies and they should, at the very least, be required to provide you with an explanation. I wouldn't expect a miraculous change in policy/practice though - as I noted, this doesn't appear to be unusual for US banks.

A FWIW:  I did in fact snail mail a letter to the President and to the CEO expressing my displeasure etc,etc,etc. Well it must have worked its way down the food chain because yesterday I got  a call from the head IT guy.  Short version: he was naturally a PC guy and did not know diddly squat about Mac and Safari and after about an hour he commenced with the pitch on how cookies really did not cause any problems etc.  I finished by telling him my next call would be to another bank who did not require 3rd party cookies.   Well an hour ago he called back.  The problem is solvable.  He must have taken it as a personal affront to his skill set.  Anyhow the bottom line is:

He instructed me to open a new tab ( he said right click but "command T" works) immediately after clicking on the "bill payment " button, and sure enuff it opened up the correct page in a new tab,( turns out this is a one time event) and  the good part is that  it set that 3rd party cookie in the "cookie manager".  By checking it as a favorite I now can access that page AND 3rd party cookies are still "Blocked" in the Privacy preferences.

I do not see any reason I cannot live with this now.


Daryl

[Xairbusdriver]

Congratulations! I'll try to remember your skill set when I need some positive changes made in some of my dealings with incompetent, unhelpful and downright stupid people! OTOH, I think I saw one of those in a mirror earlier today!