Although I've never had occasion to protest a charge on a credit card, I've always heard the claim that you have iron-clad protection against unscrupulous vendors if paying by credit card. However, I was reading an offer I got from Capitol One (not a chance in the world I'd go for it) and I found the following: SPECIAL RULE FOR CREDIT CARD PURCHASES.  If you have a problem with the quality of property or services that you purchased with a credit card and you have tried in good faith to correct the problem with the merchany, you may have the right not to pay the remaining amount due on the property or services.  There are two limitations on this right: (a) You must have made the purchase in your home state, or, if not within your home state, within 100 miles of your current mailing address; and (b) The purchase price must have been more than $50.00 These limitations do not apply if we own or operate the merchant, or if we mailed you the advertisement for the property or srervices. This sounds like too fundamental a policy for an individual card issuer to arbitrarily enforce - does this mean that that protection we all hear about is, for the most part, non-existant for mail or web orders?