Check your bank statement/Credit card details stolen

[Lawrence]

Fortunately not mine, but one of the lads on the JNS forum just got hit for about $5000.  As he only uses the card for travel and railway purchases, he is contacting the companies he used recently, the only model retailer he has used is http://www.modeltrainstuff.com/

Currently there is no concrete evidence to suggest this company was involved at all but I just wanted to make people, who buy US stock from across the pond, aware of a possible problem.  As ever make sure when buying on the net you are buying from a secure site.  Last year, Hobby Search, one of Japan's biggest on-line retailers, had thousands of card details stolen by a guy in Taiwan (I think)  so it goes on all the time.

I will update this if he gets a definitive answer

[scotsoft]

Thanks for that info Lawrence, I have bought a few things from the US but I am sure I have always been able to use PayPal.  Although I don't know if that gives me any greater protection.

cheers John.

[hairygit]

Yes, paypal is MUCH safer The only info the seller gets is name and address for delivery, and your e-mail address

[Malc]

Since my bank offered me a credit card I didn't really want, I asked them to reduce the credit limit from some huge figure to £300. If I can't use PayPal, I use this card. That way, if I do get stung, I only lose £300.

[hairygit]

Malc, even safer than that are the pre-pay credit cards you can get, you just put cash on it via any shop that does paypoint, or online direct from your bank, you only keep enough on it to pay for what you want to buy, and if you have any reason to think it's been scammed or compromised, throw it away and get another on!

[fisherman]

if it's a  fraud  on  a  credit  card you should  be  able  to  get your  money back (according  to  my   bank!)

if  it  was a  debit  card  then  you  are  not  covered

[Agrippa]

Best be on your guard, a colleague of mine received
a credit card bill with hundreds of pounds charged
by RENFE, he brought it into the office and asked
what's RENFE , when I told him he said he'd never
been to Spain, luckily his bank sorted it out and he was
reimbursed.

[EtchedPixels]

if it's a  fraud  on  a  credit  card you should  be  able  to  get your  money back (according  to  my   bank!)

if  it  was a  debit  card  then  you  are  not  covered

Most debit cards are covered by the issuing bank. Check with yours. The credit card guarantees often cover other things such as companies going bankrupt which the debit ones don't. The bank or the supplier of the goods may also have other liabilities for negligence or fraud (eg if it was internal by their employees).

The banks tend to be fairly helpful as they simply remove the money from the merchant who was hit by the fraud (plus a penalty) and give it back to you. They don't actually take the hit themselves.

All varies by country of course. The US has surprisingly strong regulation here, the UK arrangement is complete pants by comparison with the police refusing to do anything but dump it on the banks whose duties are limited and whose processes are unaccountable, and then on via appeal to an Ombudsuman's office which has a reputation for poor decision making and then the courts to rip up the Ombudsman's results. All very messy. In the US it's mostly up to the bank to show you made the payment.

They will also never tell you where they think the fraud occurred or whether they even bothered to investigate. For online ordering most companies don't see the credit data either. You'll notice they often use systems such as worldpay which are actually the bank.

Actually touching/processing the numbers yourself requires a mass of security regulations and audits which are expensive.


Weirdly in the UK cheques are much more strongly protected. Anyone would think the banking industry didn't own the government back then

Alan

[Flakmunky]

My bank rang me on Tuesday morning regarding a fraudulent transaction for £1.00 that was attempted. The fraudsters tried to set up a recurring Visa transaction (avoid these like the plague, people, you can't stop them. Believe it or not, only the company that set them up can...) but luckily my bank (Nationwide) spotted it and declined it.

When my wife (whose card number the fraudsters had tried to use) spoke to the fraud department, they said that the MO is to try a small amount (typically less than £5) then bang some big transactions through... We had several thousand in our account to cover a cheque we ad written for building work we have had done...   

So keep an eye on your statements and pray your card issuer is as on the ball as my bank was!

[1936ace]

same with me, had heaps of buys on our itunes account which is linked to our c/card. A lot of little 99cents ones must be the kids buying sones and then a few at 39 and 51dollars so i checked it out and we had not bought them and it was the same we were getting stung for apts apple were brilliant refunded all the amounts can say enough of theri service especially as they had to spoon feed me through my own account as the wife and kids are the ones who use it. also our bank were great too, a first!
bart

[Malc]

 

same with me, had heaps of buys on our itunes account which is linked to our c/card. A lot of little 99cents ones must be the kids buying sones and then a few at 39 and 51dollars so i checked it out and we had not bought them and it was the same we were getting stung for apts apple were brilliant refunded all the amounts can say enough of theri service especially as they had to spoon feed me through my own account as the wife and kids are the ones who use it. also our bank were great too, a first!
bart

I didn't like the idea of putting in my CC details into I tunes, so I buy vouchers, especially when  moneysavingexpert.com tells me they are on special offer.

[1936ace]

yes and that is what i have done, kids cant buy anything without me knowing and ive set it up so you can only use itunes cards that you have bought.anyway our local supermarkets have these on sale most of the time so you can save more,

[Trainfish]

As the title says really, check your bank statements, I check mine weekly if not more often than that.

Yesterday I looked at mine online and saw a direct debit payment of £2.99 paid to "Totalcare and Support" and didn't recognise it. I immediately looked up the company and also did a search on the internet which threw up various pages regarding this issue, try THIS ONE for example. It seems an old database or databases are being used by a foreign company to take cash from potentially thousands of people. £2.99 may not sound a lot but multiply that by a few thousand people who maybe don't check their bank statements as often as I do and you come up with a tidy little sum.

My bank were very good about it and refunded it immediately saying I was only the second person to report this but there will potentially be thousands more 'victims'. They also gave me the phone number for the company but that unsurprisingly was constantly engaged.

So, there are a few names which could appear on your bank statements so keep an eye out for these and cancel the direct debit then speak to your bank:

Totalcare & support
Supanet
Tiny computers
Time computers
Intouch investments
Discovery store
Supadates

Beware, there may be more!

For the record I bought a plasma TV from Time/Tiny just before they went belly up (10+ years ago) which is why they had my account details.

If the mods deem this is in the wrong section feel free to move it.

[Pengi]

Thanks for posting the warning on this Trainfish. Sadly this is becoming all to familiar these days

[cudders]

Don't panic.. Any transaction using a credit card is protected. If it's fraud you don't pay..

This even works if you want to stop a continous debit agreement.

Don't shout, I work for a bank.. 

Cudders