I wonder what people with a lot of cards do.
For some reason Amex Got suspicious of two charges on her AmEx. One made this morning.
It was a $300.00 + charge to some place out of the country.
The other one was odd. It was a charge for one dollar, one for three dollars and one for five dollars in succession to an Itunes place. AmEx removed the charges and canceled the card. They are sending her a new one.
I have to wonder how someone got her number? ???
This has been worrying me lately. I posted earlier about Credit insurance which I didn't get. I locked our files instead.
Very upsetting :-\ I don't worry about being mugged, robbed or carjacked. That's easy enough to fight off but this is someone you can't shoot or get your hands on. It's like trying to stop the wind.
Most likely a clerk from a store where she used it legitimately stole the number. Happens more and more.
In our case it was a big-box home store in Albuquerque. She used our debit card number and used it to buy gift cards. The average charge was about $27.00. She [the clerk] got almost a $1,000 before I noticed. The bank was not the least suspicious. I got to see the digital receipts, but was not allowed any other info after I reported it. She would buy a $25 gift card and some batteries, or some other small item near the register. She would just punch in the numbers, scan an extra small item, and tender it out. She would do this while it was busy, in between other transactions. Bold! I do know that she did this to lots of people, because they went back and reviewed her sales log and she sure sold a lot of gift cards.
Amex does a very good job. Sometimes too good. My wife and I use Amex almost exclusively if we are not using debit. We were on vacation last year and they denied a charge, which is embarrassing. I called them from the restaurant and they allowed the charge after asking me for some identity verification. They have a system that learns your spending habits and flags things that look odd. In our case, we bought airline tickets in the morning (for a different trip) and then used the card that afternoon in California. The manager of the place told me it happens all the time with Amex. Ironically my corporate Amex is never flagged.
If you have a Bank of America card, and you are online, look into ShopSafe by logging into your account. I use it for places that won't take Amex. It creates a unique, one-time number and credit limit/expiration date linked to your card. You plug that number into the payment section at checkout. If somebody steals the number, the card is declined. Say you want to buy something from a vendor for $500. Create a card with a limit of $501, and expiration date of
It works great - I wish Amex had it.
We had the denial experience a couple of times too---finally got smart enough to call CC company just before we left on trip and inform them of travel plans----works well. I am impressed and grateful for the banks vigilance.
Well however they got it, someone and I assume a teenager in Europe, tried to but a large number of T shirts from a company that markets T shirts and Hoodies with Band logos. ???
So much for Obama's cashless society. :-\
having a credit card cloned is very common
Even in 5 star hotels it has happened to me- brand new card- checked in- within an hour it was being used 400m away buying a mountain bike- then the next day in Aruba in a diamond shop and at about the same time a very large family was having a wicked sunday lunch at a restaurant in la guira
When the bank called the first question was wether I was male or female- as it was a girl trying to buy the diamond and the store called the bank as "Paul" was wearing a skirt
That was the first of 3 times....
The banks are pretty quick at catching these things- sometimes too good when you go on vacation and minutes after your first purchase your card is on hold !
Glenn has had one of his card #'s stolen 3 different times of the past 10 yrs. I pay the bills & always look at the statements. The 1st time there were purchases from a surf shop, a health food store, plant shop etc totalling $3000+. He'd been working down in Los Angeles on & off for the past year & that's where the charges were from - he hadn't been there for at least 3 mo's & these were new charges. I showed him the bill & asked if he'd made those purchases - of course he said no. The credit card company reversed the charges & issued new cards. The last time was within the last year - just for a few hundred IIRC. We haven't been charged for any of it.
I have a card through USAA & they watch for any changes in charges. I had them decline a purchase at a nice clothing store one time (I'd been clothes shopping all day & made several purchases at different stores) very embarrassing as there was only 1 cashier & a whole line of people waiting - it took about 45 min to get it straightened out. USAA sent me a gift card for $50 due to the embarrassment. I felt sorry for the poor cashier.
I had bogus charges on a debit card- just dumb luck that I spotted in time, as you only have 3 days to dispute it with a debit card. They made one small purchase, probably to see if the number was good, and then bought a $1200 one-way plane ticket to Spain. The charges were made in CA, and I live in FL, so the number was likely sold. The bank was good about it, but the level of protection isn't as good with a debit card, so I ditched it in favor of a credit card.
Everytime I hand a CC to a waiter or anyone else where it is out of my direct sight the same scenario flashes through my mind. I regularly go to the website and check transactions. Also, recently found that the CC site had a button to enable it to automatically send us an email alert whenever my acct is charged via phone or whenever the card is not physically swiped through a machine---not foolproof but, does provide some measure of confidence.
Id be surprised if USAA didn't offer same service----I also have one of their cards (seldom used). They are a first-class organization.
Quote from: rwanders on May 23, 2011, 07:01:28 PM
Everytime I hand a CC to a waiter or anyone else where it is out of my direct sight the same scenario flashes through my mind.
I have been a huge CC user for decades. One thing I do not do anymore at all is to ever have the card leave my sight. I love the proliferation of vendors who have the card readers on a pedestal at the check out. No one else ever handles the card. We use cash in restaurants, about the only place Iuse cash.
There are very small card swipers available online. They allow a crook to swipe the card and record all the data from the mag stripe. Then any old card can be recoded with that info and purchases made someplace else.
The BofA shopsafe is great for online purchases. Citibank also has a similar unique one time use system available on request. The only potential issue with those is for online purchases like movie theater tickets, or the O'reilly Auto order/pay online and pickup at store. Those require the card used for the purchase to ID the pickup.