Sunday, February 10, 2008

Removing Credit Card from Xbox Live

I accidentally charged an old credit card on XBox Live tonight. I started looking around to figure out how to remove the old card. Half an hour later, I stumbled upon the solution. Since it's so obtuse, I will describe it here.

Notes: You must have a Windows Live ID associated with your XBox account, and you must have another credit card tied to your XBox Live account. You will be transferring all charges FROM one card TO another card. This apparently also has the side effect of "removing" the old card from the system. If you need to do something different, like to cancel XBox Live, you might need to call support instead.


  1. Go to Microsoft Billing and Account Management. Log in.

  2. You will see a list of credit cards attached to your Windows Live ID. Note that this will only work if you have associated your gamertag with a Windows Live ID. (In my case, you can see that I have removed one of my cards).


  3. Click the card you want to delete. This will take you to a screen that includes this:


  4. Choose "Go to payment method information". You will be at a screen that includes this:


  5. Click "Use a different payment method," and select the card that you want to use.



I could make jokes about how Microsoft is just looking for an excuse to keep your money. Instead, I'll joke that they can't design user interfaces. I mean, it's not like anybody else has solved the cancel-a-credit-card interface problem.

Oh wait. This is from the iTunes music store:



Of course, this should be no surprise to any 360 owner. The 360's interface is among the worst things ever created by Redmond. Yes, I think it's worse than Clippy. Quickly - where do you go to get a list of your active downloads? If you're in a game, the only way is by pressing the "XBox" button, and selecting PERSONAL SETTINGS! Clearly, downloads are a setting. There are a number of settings which you change in 2 different places. Themes are one example. Also, the 360 is the only console whose menus are affected by the speed of your internet connection. Quite often, I can't start a game for 30 seconds or more because the menus haven't yet loaded (presumably, downloading ads off the XBox servers).

It's worth noting that the XBox 360 has been out for OVER 2 YEARS! The original XBox was only around for 4 years before the 360 was introduced. This console is half dead, and the user interface is only beta quality. Nice play, Microsoft.
Update:

I noticed that Microsoft added an item to their help center in the XBox interface. You can instead go to xbox.com/accounts to manage your credit cards. The interface is a little nicer, though they still dump you back to the old system to transfer your XBox Live subscription from one card to another.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey man thanks i was like on the live crap trying to figure out on marketplace... and yeah you would think they would put a lil more into this whole process to be able to switch from one card to another for monthly payments... thanks again man saved me alot of stress, not having to talk to habeeb on the phone. Jay

Anonymous said...

hey i was just wondering i am from ireland and would a 3v card work for a method of payment

Anonymous said...

Thanks man i spent hours pondering the xbox.com to do this.

Anonymous said...

Thanks SO much! I found the site before and saved it to Favorites on my laptop, but had it recently wiped and lost all my info!! This helps out A LOT!

Anonymous said...

Thanks for posting this, I was trying to do this exact thing (remove an old credit card). I agree that Microsoft exceeded even their own standards of incompetence when they designed this flow.

Orionsaint said...

Thank you that actually worked!

Admin Josh said...

Thanks Man!

Unknown said...

THANK YOU!!!! I've been trying to figure this out for a while now. Thought it was impossible. Now, all of my wildest dreams have come true!

PhoenixRizez said...

STILL AN XBOX LIE!!!
The remove button ONLY works if you DIDN’T use your CC to buy the GOLD membership.

I’m an older gamer and have 4 kids ranging from 14 to 26 and the older one’s have moved out. I told them ALL that I’d pay to keep their XBL Gold Memberships active forever because it lets us stay in touch with each other now that the older ones moved out. I set up all their accounts with one CC auto-renewing their Gold Memberships.

However, one of them decides to go crazy and buy a bunch of Arcade games without asking first (and that’s not part of our deal), so stupid me simply wants to remove the card info from XBL… NOT HAPPENING!!!

Apparently, since I bought the Gold Membership with the CC, it’s ATTACHED to that purchase and CAN’T be deleted even with the USLESS “Remove” button!!! Even after I went into the account and turned OFF the auto-renew option, it STILL won’t let me remove the card. The most screwed up thing about this is the membership is PAID IN FULL and after turning off the auto-renew option, it should NOT be tied to the CC any more. XBL Customer Service, live from India, is a friggin’ joke. Someone on here said after turning off the auto-renew option, you have to wait till the current membership expires, but for me, that’s 9 months away.

MY SOLUTION: Delete XBL from the equation by doing 2 things…
1. Went to MY Credit Card website, clicked “Lost Card” and had a new card & new number sent to me within a few days. RENEW THAT XBL!!!
2. Found the Maximus Cards website (www.maximuscards.com) so now whenever I want to renew the kids’ accounts or give them points, I don’t have to go to the store and waste time. I can SAFELY use my Credit Card to buy renewals or points from Maximus Cards, they email me the Redeem Code within about 2 minutes and just forward copy the code onto an email or XBL message to the kids to use. There’s about a 10 minute delay from the time I clicked “order” at Maximus Cards to the time XBL accepted the code, but considering I didn’t leave my living room and can do it 24/7, I can live with 10 minutes.

Anonymous said...

Yes I have the same issue with kids charging, I could not delete the card. I opened a microsoft live account but could not link the xbox live account because apparently having a under age account and then a parent account does not mesh together and therefore can't delete with microsoft live. I am trying the asking for a new card method so the card number will be different, although I suspect they will change on their end which will continue the issue. LB

keith said...

they have my card on lock 2 because purchased discounted xbox gold membership i just changed my address and experation date on card profile and zipcode

4SaleUSA said...

You can’t remove a credit card that is associated with an active Xbox Live membership or Zune account. If you try to remove the credit card associated with an active Xbox Live membership or Zune account, you will be prompted to add a new payment option.

If you don’t want to add another payment method, contact Support for help removing your payment method. Please have your gamertag or Microsoft account name and payment information available.