Credit Card Fraud

Well, it's something that only happens to other people - I thought.

8 am and I was wondering whether to have another 5 minutes or if I really ought to get out of bed when the phone rang. Some man enquired if he could speak to me and said he was from Barclays in Northampton. It seems there were unusual transactions on my card and he would like to ask me a few security questions. "Oh yes, what sort of unusual transactions?" "Well, I cannot tell you unless you answer some security questions" Having heard that this is how some of these crooks get information I declined his offer, said I didn't know him, hadn't asked anybody to ring and put the phone down.

About an hour later I managed, at last, to get through to Barclays Fraud department to ask if this had been a genuine call or was it a fraudster and was surprised to be told they had been trying to talk to me!! At least three transactions were on my card but very luckily they were for minimal amounts - £1, £12 and £5.50. They immediately cancelled my card and will be sending me a new one and asked that I checked my account to see if there are any other amounts that should not be there.

I am always so very careful with my card, shred my old statements etc.
How on earth do people get hold of this information. I am only thankful it was not a huge amount.

 

Well i'm normally pretty good at finding stuff out but from the limited info you've provided, I can only glean that you are femail and live in Norwich.

So I guess this is a random attack, someone got lucky with your credit card number, or it was a genuine digit mistake, someone transposed a few numbers while buying something & it ended up on your account.

 

I thought they only contacted you if the transactions were 'unusual'? like £1,000, for example...

suppose the fraudster could have taken your money out from abroad, though.

 

Happened to me recently - £499.99 from Screwfix Bank asked me to phone screwfix and see if they could shed any light - they couldn't track anything without an order number, so they had to wait till the bank clawed back the money!!!
Seemingly its more common if you use your card to pay at a garage or restaurant - suppose they take the card away to process and can copy the information needed!!!

SF

 

I had exactly the same thing happen last week, someone had bought £15 phone credit online with my card, the bank had noticed as we don't buy phone credit we all have contract phones, thank goodness they noticed before any larger amounts were taken, we just had to fill out a form and got our money back, I've since been told(don't know if its true) that to buy phone credit online you only need the last 4 digits of a credit card which are usually printed on every receipt you recieve!!!!! so if you accidently drop one or put them in your rubbish anyone can get your details.

 

Seems I'm not the only one - but I am mystified as I do not ever take my credit card out with me - I use my debit card for shopping and obviously that is a different number.
The last credit payment was my motor insurance on line. I pay everything at the end of each month and always have done. ARMANDII I am surprised your bank does not allow this now.

 

Most card terminals print two copies of the card transaction - the customer copy usually has most of the number starred out (ie **** **** **** 1234)
The shop copy has the full card number, this number + the 3 digit on the back is needed to use the card online.

Vodaphone let you top up by entering the last 4 digits of your card number - but you have to register the card first, and it only works with the phone account it is registered to. So you couldn't log on, and buy a topup for another phone using this method.

 

How upsetting for you Jjordie. I know it's only small amounts of money and you'll get it back but it's the thought that someone was able to get your details and use them.
A few years ago I got a call from my bank saying the police had a person in their custody who had my details and those of a lot of other people. Fortunately there had been no transactions on my account but I was a bit rattled thinking someone else could just obtain the information.
I'm glad it didn't turn out more serious for you.

 

I've had to speak on the phone instore to my card provider many times because of 'suspicious activity' when I've been making multiple purchases (avoiding store anti-bulk buying policies) and from several stores in the same locality, but all I've been doing is bulk buying some non-perishable (or freezable) product where a combination of something like 100% extra free + on BOGOF has made it incredibly cheap and I've seriously stockpiled them.

I don't complain, but say thank you for being vigilant.

 

I had this a couple of years ago with Barclaycard. Like you, I was sceptical about the Fraud Department and told them so. They advised me to ring the number on my Barclaycard statement and ask to be put through to the Fraud Department, which I did. Attempts had been made to use my card for signficant amounts at Jessops and Dixons. The only time I had ever used this card was to purchase online from Cotton Traders. It then came to light that Cotton Traders website had been hacked into and I certainly wasn't the only one. Fortunately I didn't lose anything because the fraudulent transactions were not authorised. It certainly put me on my guard though

 

A few years back, my Virgin card details were stolen when I made a purchase online. I'd only ever used that card for online shopping but never made purchases more than £50 or so.

Then one day Virgin contacted me regarding 'unusual activity' on my account. Seems someone had used it to purchase a £500 laptop from a shop in Liverpool and it had been flagged up on their system as a possible fraud. They suggested that it was probably stolen by a member of staff at an on-line store I'd recently used. But all was well - they refunded the money and changed my card.

I was really pleased with this - no worries, no panic at an errant entry on my statement.
Done like dinner!

 

SausageFingers - I do not ever use my credit card when I am out - only take my debit card - so there was no possibilty of a customer copy.