Cardholder

Within the payments ecosystem, a cardholder is the specific party or entity to which a credit or debit card has been issued. Often, this is the individual or organization whose name is printed on the card, but there are situations where the name of an authorized user (such as a spouse, an employee, or any other party given permission by the cardholder to make purchases) is on the card, even if they are not the actual account holder.

Authorized users have no legal liability for the card whatsoever. An account’s primary cardholder is ultimately responsible for all card usage and maintenance, including making payments, requesting credit limit increases, identifying fraudulent charges, and so on.  It is also possible to have a joint cardholder account, where both parties are considered primary account holders and share responsibility for the account.