Credit Card Code to Track Gun Sales Approved by Standards Group

  • Pensions, Amalgamated Bank pressed card companies for new code
  • New gun code could be first step to tracking suspicious buys

An employee passes rifles for sale at a store in West Point, Kentucky.

Photographer: Jon Cherry/Bloomberg
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A credit card categorization code that could improve the tracking of gun sales was approved by an international panel that sets standards for the payments industry, according to New York City Comptroller Brad Lander and Amalgamated Bank.

The International Organization for Standardization, based in Geneva, Switzerland, approved the bank’s application for a merchant category code for gun and ammunition stores to use when processing transactions, according to news releases from both Amalgamated and Lander. A merchant category code is a four-digit number used by credit card companies to classify businesses. It typically indicates the types of services or goods being sold to consumers.