By Laura Hipshire
THE ERICKSON TRIBUNE
Last month, I recounted my personal experience with identify theft—someone used my debit card to order more than $700 worth of merchandise online, right under my nose!
I’ll pick up where I left off last time—I was asking myself how on earth this could have happened to me, “the savvy consumer.” After all, I kept my debit card on me at all times and checked my bank account online every night.
As for the phony order: I informed “Rhett” to cancel the order immediately and asked him to please have the transaction reversed so I wouldn’t be out the money.
He assured me that in a few days it would be resolved. A few hours later I received a call from my bank informing me of at least one more “suspicious” charge on my account for some clothing (it was around $7.00). They cancelled the debit card and sent a new one to me immediately.
Money returned; still shaken
The whole fiasco caused me untold emotional distress, not to mention shorted my finances and even caused problems with other bills (such as my car insurance) because I paid these bills online. Since my debit card was cancelled, I was in a bit of a fix until the new one arrived.
Eventually, about a week later, the video vendor issued me a credit and I got my money back. Since I wasn’t “out” the money very long, my local police department wasn’t interested in pursuing the case, even though I had the scammer’s address.
Moral of the story
Even the savviest of consumers can be identity theft targets. I prided myself on staying well-informed, not giving out my personal information, and being cautious, but even all that wasn’t enough to keep me safe from clever identity thieves.
Today, I don’t purchase as much as I used to online; I write checks or use cash instead so I don’t have a lot of personal fodder for these scammers to find. I still don’t know how they found my debit card info and probably never will.