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by b112 1388 days ago
Same thing here, was told this by my bank when issued a US funds card.

A hint ; the padding doesn't have to be zeros (for my bank, when it approves during checks). So for example if you are doing 12300, this may not be a valid zip code.

In my case, my 12300 wasn't valid. I clued into this, because the code worked in most places where it should, but not a few others. I then looked up some codes, and realised that 12300 wasn't a real zip code.

So I Googled, and tried 123xx, where xx matches a real, valid zip code.

This gets by some checks, which table-lookup against valid zip codes, before sending a request to validate the zip remotely.

Even better, I then found an address for a condemned building on that same zip code. When required, I used that address as the 'bill to' address, and even that works sometimes. Very helpful when snowbirding, and spending 4+ months in the US.