Identity Theft

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BCoffClone125

Well-Known Member
SuperFanatic
SuperFanatic T2
May 19, 2010
1,180
1,211
113
Salt Lake City, UT
So today I went online to check my bank account (which I should probably do more often) and found over a dozen fraudulent charges on my bank card from today alone. After further investigation, there were a few more processed just a few days earlier that I hadn't noticed before. Most of the charges were at random places in Tuscon, AZ...nowhere near central Iowa where I live. After spending nearly an hour talking to various people on the phone I finally got a claim resolved and my account frozen. It still will take me about two weeks to get a new card, and probably a week or longer to get the claim resolved.

I was just wondering if any other CFers on here have had problems with identity theft like this before, and what happened to them? I guess misery loves company...and I'm definitely not a happy camper right now :mad:
 

hawkeyeh8r

Well-Known Member
Jun 10, 2010
2,159
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Ames
that sucks man. at least you were able to get it taken care of. i had something similar to this happen with my cellphone. when we were in NYC someone cloned my phone and was making calls to either puerto rico or one of those caribbean islands. it was pain getting everything fixed and getting a new number but it was nice to be done with it. thankfully i havent had any problems with my CC or debit card
 

CRcyclone6

Well-Known Member
Bookie
Dec 27, 2007
11,711
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Cedar Rapids
about 8 years ago I received a bunch of calls for a guy with the same name as me. all these places where I never applied for credit let alone have a card from that store. Turns out the last 4 of my ssn were the same as his 1st 4. talk about a nightmare. had to dispute all these credit cards, took forever. they all got cleaned up though.
 
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Gonzo

Well-Known Member
Mar 10, 2009
23,189
25,258
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Behind you
Yes, a few years ago my wife was doing our online banking and noticed a bunch of charges on one of my credit cards for proactive (I think) and some other facial creams for people with bad acne. Only amounted to a few hundred bucks but I got in touch with customer support and after some looking into, the ******* had her purchases shipped to her home address. So it was pretty easy to find the culprit. Turns out it was someone in Memphis, and I had been in Memphis a week earlier on business. She worked either at the airport, the hotel, or the FedEx Arena (went to a Grizzlies game), which were the only places I used that card, and lifted my number. From what I was told it's pretty common for people to lift numbers off of travelers and try sliding smaller purchases through, hoping they don't notice.
 

DurangoCy

Well-Known Member
Jul 5, 2010
6,378
4,253
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Durango, CO
That stinks, I hope you get it cleaned up quick. Planet Money on NPR just had a show on credit cards and it costs the banks/credit cards $3 billion/year, but they make 12-18% on up to $800 billion so it's not that big of a deal to them. I guess that's why they usually fix things so quickly.

The State of CO misread my SSN on my first state tax return, so I used to get harrassing phone calls from collection agencies about paying my taxes. I sent a letter to the State to try and clear it up, but apparently they can't read typed letters either. Somehow they had my correct phone number; but wrong SSN, Name, and I never forwarded my mail after I lived in a ghetto for 6 months so they couldn't find that either.

Over the course of a couple of 5 years I'd get multiple calls every year around tax time, which became more and more of a chance for me to be a jerk to the collection agent. At the beginning it was me hanging up on them, at the end it was the other way around. :tongue:
 
Nov 6, 2010
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Blacksburg, VA
I had mine stolen in Ames (the cops think it was a person at a local pizza joint, I never heard any charges coming from it, but maybe they caught them on bigger charges than a couple $100 on a student's credit card) in 2009. Caught it right away with charges being made at sites I don't frequent. My bank overnighted me a new card for free and cancelled the old one. But boy was that a pain in the butt.

One thing the OP should do is file a police report with your local police department/sheriff's office (where you live). Maybe there is a wider ring and although they probably won't be anything. but maybe with your report, they can connect the dots to other cases or at least have an starting point if others have had a similar thing happen to them and can maybe stop this slimeball.

Also OP, make sure you file a fraud alert with all three credit bureaus so your credit does not get affected.