- Scams Can Be Worse Than the Disease - March 25, 2020
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- The Most Terrifying Scam - October 11, 2019
Recently while checking online for my credit card statements, I came across an unusual charge for $474.92. This was accompanied by a foreign transaction charge for $14.24. This is significant for a number of reasons…
- I haven’t traveled to a foreign country in over a decade.
- I have never authorized a charge from a foreign country.
- The listed company, TPS UK, is the United Kingdom equivalent of our own donotcall.gov anti-solicitation phone registry. And, as such, is a free government service. They are not likely to be involved with this scam.
- It’s nearly $500 bucks!
I started a chat with one of the credit card issuers agents. Explaining the erroneous charge and that the fraud needed to be investigated. After doing about 10 minutes worth of research, “Brett” explained that he couldn’t do a thing for me and that I’d have to call in to customer service to report the fraud. Why he was unable to determine this when I told him initially of the fraud bewilders me.
It was then off to the toll-free number to again report the fraud for the first time. Eventually, the menu allowed me to say “fraud” and connected me with a customer service representative (CSR). Again, I recounted the fraud issue. Again, the CSR checked the details, and again I was told I’d have to transfer to another department.
Finally I was connected with “Alex”, who explained that he could assist me. He got the vital details and said their fraud team would investigate. Further, he had canceled the card and would reissue a new one to my address on file. Seems like that should have been done the moment the word fraud was typed on chat. But eventually is better than not at all.
This is a roundabout way of saying that if you notice erroneous charges on your credit card statement… if you feel that your card might have been compromised in any way… make sure that the card issuer gets you a new card with a new number. Make sure to file a fraud report so that the charges will be reversed.
Check on the company that the charges were allegedly from. In this instance, “TPS UK eCOM” brings up a variety of posts asking about the legitimacy of the charges. That plays in your favor when the fraud team sets out to investigate. And, if the investigation ends with the charges not being reversed gives you a lot of ammo to request it be re-investigated. Hopefully with a bit more diligence.
In the end, watch out for yourself. The credit card issuer “might” find a problem. But, if you’re vigilant, you have a much better possibility of finding anything that might pop up.
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