Rant about Credit Card Fraud!!

[Ranger__101]

I really hate credit cards right now!!

I made a few purchases on line with them last month and I was looking at my unbilled activity and found 4 unauthorized charges all in the last 2 weeks.

I had the problem with an AT&T Credit card and even when I got my new account number charges were still made on the new account. Granted I decided after that I'd close that account since I don't need a stack of credit cards any way.

It's hard to pinpoint where they got the number since it was over a month ago that I made a charge for the 1st time to a vendor. Oh well, I gave Citicard a call tonight and they helped me get those into dispute, close my current account and send out new cards.

The pain of it is I've got a few regular bills that I have auto pay and I've got to change them until I get the new account number. I got so torked off tonight that I closed down my Ebay account, Paypal account and a few others that decide to keep my credit card number on file!!

I really hate that fact that so many companies keep your credit card number on file and leave it open to internal theft of the number or external theft. I'd much rather have to enter the information in each time that I make a purchase.

I guess I should have taken advantage of the one time use credit card numers that Citicard and a few others will issue for online purcases. At least that way even if someone got it, it would be a dead account.

Such a pain to deal with and have to keep watch over closely now until I get this all completed.

How many of you have had unauthorized charges and had to go though the process of disputing them and changing account numbers.

[Whitewolf1970]

Ouch! I'm sorry... some people can be so rude when stealing someone's credit cards and charged 'em. I had a couple time a female thief. She put down her address of where I LIVE. Same names of course, but she's put her informations on my record so I called and disputed. As for college..(fuming :mad: !!!) that same girl borrowed the book loan that she never paid around $417, causing the accounting clerk to refuse to hand my check until this got resolved by financial aid office: WRONG IDENTITY. She got kicked out of college immediately. I can't imagine $417 with what textbooks? Keep checking your credit reports. I haven't use 'em for three years, I'm fed up.

[Bearcat06]

I'm working a case right now with Discover card. Someone in my jursidiction tried to change cards to get a lower interest rate and never received the card. When she started looking into it, someone apparently interecepted the card and spent about a grand before it was red-flagged.....

[ChesCopPodz]

I can't imagine $417 with what textbooks

That sounds cheap for a semester of college books

[Whitewolf1970]

That sounds cheap for a semester of college books

Sounds cheap but not everyone can afford textbooks, not even the used textbooks. I bought four textbooks in Fall 2004 for Administration of Justice (3)and English (3) for $189.20. Sometimes, I paid $218. I've no idea why the $417. Probably the medical textbooks?

[retdetsgt]

Once I got a charge on my card and the only reference was an 800 #. I called it and it was some homefurnishing company off the Internet. Then I got a $1200 charge to a Honda dealer in S.F. I called my credit card company and they were great about it. They credited my card right away and went after the person. Turned out to be some woman. I have no idea how she got my CC number. Although I was always careful to shred any receipts that had the full CC # on it, my wife admitted she hadn't always been so careful. That's the only thing I can think of, is either they got it out of the trash somewhere or some clerk in a store stole it. If it was the latter, not much you can do.

Again, I do have to praise First Card, they were really nice about it. They sent me an affidavit to sign and they prosecuted the woman.

[Old Trooper]

Man, that sucks BIG TIME! I make a lot of online purchases, pay bills, bank, etc. Guess I have just been lucky.

[DolphinTattoos]

Sounds cheap but not everyone can afford textbooks, not even the used textbooks. I bought four textbooks in Fall 2004 for Administration of Justice (3)and English (3) for $189.20. Sometimes, I paid $218. I've no idea why the $417. Probably the medical textbooks?

I'm taking three courses/10 credits this semester, 5 books for $488. My accounting book alone was $160.

[DolphinTattoos]

Back when I was stupid enough to live with other people, my roommate's boyfriend got my Visa number off the bill that was on the table. Unfortunately, I had auto pay from my checking account at a set $50/month to pay that one. It took my card getting declined before I knew what was happening. I started going through my statements to find over $1,000 in charges, in addition to 900 number charges to our phone bill, but my roommate paid the utitilies so I didn't know about that either. She just paid them, keeping his secret all the while he was charging toys for her on MY credit card. I canceled the card, VISA made me pay the first $50, the rest was taken off.

They both denied the whole thing. I filed a police report, but unfortunately I couldn't prove anything and nothing was ever done to him. All I had as evidence was phone bills, where the calls were placed at times my roommate and I were at work. He was the only other person with a key to our apartment. But, I couldn't prove he was there that day since he didn't have a job (he was there EVERY day!)

I'm sure he ended up in jail for something else by now though.

[Whitewolf1970]

I'm taking three courses/10 credits this semester, 5 books for $488. My accounting book alone was $160.

So that explained why some textbooks are very expensive depending on which courses like accounting, EMT, FF, and Medical Technology. Few AJ classes have textbooks which are almost $100. Not bad...I didn't purchase used books except for this Winter Intersession 2005.

[Ranger__101]

WOW looking at the poll.. No wonder credit card interest rates are so high. Even though places that take credit cards on line get charged back. A place that actually takes the card still gets paid .

I didn't realize that it was common to get hit several times for unauthorized charges either.

[DolphinTattoos]

This is off the subject, but related.

I've noticed lately that I don't have to sign my receipt at every store. I stopped at Cub Foods the other night, my purchase totalled just under $20. I had pen in hand and ready to sign and she handed me my receipt and told me to have a good night. I was not required to sign.

I was kind of miffed about this and the person with me told me it was a new procedure to speed up the line. If your purchase is under a certain amount, no signature needed.

I'm still kind of miffed about this, but figured it was just this chain and wouldn't happen again.

Last night we stopped at McD's for a quick dinner before I had to go to school. The total was $6.50, again, I didn't have to sign. I'm assuming McD's has the same policy as Cub.

This really irks me. Especially since I have "See ID" on the back of my card, along with my written signature. If I don't have to sign, the merchant is not likely to ask for ID with my card, which in turn, if it ever gets stolen, the thief will not get ID'd either.

(This is my cash card by the way, I'm not that broke that I need to charge groceries and fast food )

[soundwave]

For Dolphin: Just so you know, as long as the purchase is under $20, just about every business out there is not going to ask for ID or a signature because they aren't required to do so by law. (And as a side note, it's been that way for at least 5 years now. ;O)

Now, some information about using your credit card online... Ranger_101, a couple of the best places that you can use your credit card is on eBay and PayPal. eBay is no new comer to online transactions and PayPal is regulated by the FDIC because it acts like an online bank. In fact, I have a MasterCard attached to my PayPal account and it works just like the same one you'd get from a regular bank. It is highly unlikely that either eBay or PayPal was involved in any of the problems you experienced because I personally know that both companies (PayPal's owned by eBay, btw) have employee monitoring practices that would make the CIA jealous. =O)

If you are considering using your credit card online, make sure you have a buffer of some sort in place between the merchant and your money. If you have a PayPal account (or similar service with your bank), generate a temporary credit card number that you can use to purchase goods online that is only available to be used once. Also if you have a PayPal account, you can also use your PayPal account itself to pay for goods (available on even major sites like Overstock.com now) or put money into your account and get a debit card from them with a MasterCard logo (like I did). This will make it so that it is used like regular Visa logo credit cards attached to checking accounts and will only be good for the amount of money you have in your PayPal account. Out of all of the companies that offer this type of service, the only ones I would recommend would be either PayPal or your own bank -- no other.

When you want to buy something from a WebSite, shop around. Not only will you more-than-likely find better prices somewhere else, you can compare the WebSites themselves. Look at the general design of the site and compare it with any of the major sites that you know of (e.g. Amazon.com, eBay.com, TigerDirect.com, MSN.com, Yahoo.com, etc.). If there is not a ridiculous amount of information available in the help sections or you cannot find a 24/7 contact telephone number, or even if you cannot find full contact information for Customer Support, DON'T SHOP THERE! Basically this goes back to the principal that if you hear a little voice in your head telling you that there's something not quite right about the site, there probably is a good reason.

Take it from someone that has done computer and Internet security for years: Anyone, and I mean ANYONE, can make a WebSite or send you an Email message that looks legitimate on the surface. None of the scammers are going to go through all the detail of populating the site with a lot of information. That's the #1 thing that you should be looking for in any site. Good online merchants have the same questions, concerns and everything else under the sun from customers just like you -- they should have answers to all of these questions quickly at hand (or almost pushed at you) just for the simple reason that providing this information all the time detracts from making them money.

The other things that you should notice is ease of use in shopping and constant contract-like small print all over the place. They want you to have the quickest possible process to pay them money, that's a benefit for both you and them so it should be informative and easy. You should be getting a lot of small print all over the place for information about rebates, terms of service, privacy policies, billing policies, etc. Merchants don't want to be sued so they should be where they need to be. Scammers who are interested in taking your credit card information aren't interested in being sued, so you will most-likely not see anything or little.

Just some FYI for everyone! =O) Cheers.

[Ranger__101]

Very good advice. I think the majority of credit card theft still happens from bad employees who get the numbers right from the card itself or receipts.

Then there are the companies who don't shread their credit card receipts when they are past the point they need to retain them and just throw them in the trash.

As a consumer you can do all the right things, but it only takes one person to screw it up for you.

[Ranger__101]

Soundwave, just as an FYI Paypal and E-bay are not FDIC insured or reviewed by the FDIC. The only thing that is FDIC insured is any funds they placed in an FDIC insured bank.

So when your charging anything on a Paypal Mastercard you are relying on Mastercard to resolve any conflicts for you since they are the card issuer and are only removing any funds that you have at Paypal.

Here's the quote from the Paypal Site:

Pass-through deposit coverage is contingent upon PayPal maintaining accurate records and on determinations of the FDIC as receiver at the time of a future receivership of any bank at which we place your funds. FDIC pass-through deposit insurance protects you only against the failure of the bank at which PayPal places your funds, and does NOT protect you against PayPal's insolvency. Through the terms of our User Agreement, we believe that your funds will also be protected from any claims of PayPal's creditors and will be returned to you even in the unlikely event of a PayPal insolvency.


Never use you visa or mastercard debit card for on line purchases. Since they are a debit card they are not regulated like regular credit cards regarding fraud and if some one does get your number they can really bring you into debt with overdraft fees and clean your account out real quick.

As you said for on line purchases it is best to get a one time number from your card issuer and only trust credit cards issued by your bank or reputable banks. That way if there is a problem they will be more likely to help out. One other bit of advice is to get a card that has 0 fraud liability. The maximum you can be liable for if you report you card lost or stolen right away is $50.00.