OT Read your bill

A few years ago I got hit with the purchase of a home gym.

Several years back I didn't pay much attention to my statements. I just spent less money than I brought in. It was going into Christmas time. I was purchasing like crazy and was accustomed to living on very little after all the purchasing. Then came January and I was paying bills off from Christmas...so still used to having not too much money. Then February. All bills paid...WHY did I have so little money in my account?!?! Well, after reviewing my account from Late November through to February I had very very small charges on my account for online p*rn. CHarges like $4.99, $1.99, $3.99. Amounts that while shopping and bill paying I never noticed missing because I didn't look at my statements and didn't balance my checkbook. Well it snowballed and snowballed until I was getting socked with tons of little charges that all ultimately totalled a little over $2000!!!!!!! I can tell you with like nine million phone calls and a lot of pretty funny phone converstaions about online p*rn site I HAD NOT visited (imagine two serious adults listing off fetish p*rn site names) I did manage to get every single penny back between financial processors and my bank. I then bought a sewing machine with my "forced savings"!!!!

Moral of the story is I now log into my bank account once a day and check my accounts.

Melissa in NJ

Polly Esther wrote:

I check my credit card website almost every day. Since we are south for the winter, I use my card to order lots of quilty things online, as well as for everyday items. BUT, I never spend more than I can afford to pay at month end. I have caught a couple of double charges at hotels, etc., and although they are a PITA to deal with, I have always managed to get the charges reversed.

So sorry, Polly! I do indeed watch very carefully. And the only card I use online is my Citi card, which generates a fake credit card number (good for one purchase at that merchant only) for each purchase, so my real Citicard number never gets out of the house. It's probably the only thing that makes me feel safe ordering online. Even the most reliable merchants can get a rat on staff.

Glad your card company was so prompt about the theft. That's a real comfort!

Well sure anyone can get a rat on staff. I even hired one myself one time. She had an awesome resume and a fine education. One evening early on, I asked her to help me change the time on the office computers. This was back in the DOS days. She was without a clue. It caused me to wonder what else was a lie. Most of it. Polly

Polly Esther wrote:

This reminded me about something similar that happened to me when my DBro passed away in Los Angeles four ago on Valentines Day. My DSis Betsy (who lives in Austin, TX) and I (I'm in No. GA) went to take care of "things" since Papa wasn't up to it. We made arrangements for Mike's cremation using an old friend of his who happened to run his own mortuary. Betsy drove to downtown L.A. (we were staying with cousins in Anaheim) to take care of paperwork while I dealt with phone calls, etc. I gave Betsy my AmEx card number since the receptionist at the mortuary had told me on the phone that they took AmEx (frequent flyer miles and all that -- LOL). When Betsy got there, Mike's friend told her that they didn't take AmEx so she phoned me and I gave her my MasterCard number. I get another call from Betsy a few minutes later telling me that the MC number won't go through and the mortuary guy had even personally phoned the charge request in after trying -- unsuccessfully -- to swipe the card several times! I told him there was NO balance on the card so it should have been OK and said I would contact MC first thing the next morning because by now their offices were closed. I called MC first thing the next morning -- early because we were leaving town ASAP to drive back to Lizard Land. I finally managed to get a live person on the phone -- even one who spoke English as his native language!! Seems that they had not honored the original request AND put a hold on my account because it seemed like a strange purchase by me. I assured the guy that I was me (I answered all those odd questions correctly) and I was trying to pay to have my recently DEAD DBro cremated!!! The poor guy at MC was tripping over his words apologizing to me and telling me that trying to charge bogus funeral stuff was not unusual for LaLa Land. He also said he would honor the original charge request and reactivate my card so that I could use it if need be whilst driving across the lovely SoCal/AZ desert 8-P******. I told the poor young man that I understood, didn't blame anyone for the SNAFU and made mention of the fact that I was sure Mike was having a good laugh over the whole thing from wherever "he" happened to be at that time :-)! CiaoMeow >^;;^<

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^< (RCTQ Queen of Kitties) Angels can't show their wings on earth but nothing was ever said about their whiskers! Visit my Photo albums at

Mary wrote: The poor guy at MC was tripping over his words apologizing to me and telling me that trying to charge bogus funeral stuff was not unusual for LaLa Land. You're kidding, right? No, I guess you're not. Don't you just know that the guys at Master Charge have seen some really strange charges? Polly

I have a VISA debit card, and I don't use it all that much. So if I happen to "hit the sales" on the Internet and run up charges on US sites I usually get a very polite call from my credit union (sometimes within 30 minutes!) asking if I am home or in the US, because of the unusual activity. I find that kind of reassuring.

Last time I laughed and explained that I was a quilter and that all the charges should be on quilt stores. The lady on the other end of the line came out with . . . . . . . yep, you guessed it - "Oh I'm a quilter too!" We had a nice chat and I recommended a couple of sites that were new to her. lol

Lets face it - some quilt stores do have "unusual" names!

I always check my bill very carefully, and match it with my credit card receipts, but sometimes "stuff" happens. We were on a trip one time, and had bought gas, and the service station attendant ran it through 4 times! We only had to pay for the 1 gas purchase. I do get irritated when the credit card company calls me, and have me listen to a long list of charges to confirm that I have actually made them. We just came back from a 12 day trip to New Mexico, and I kept telling DH that I bet Mastercard would be calling to make sure it was us. No calls, but let me use it 3 or 4 times in one day at home, and they call every time! Discover card did call me one time to tell me that someone had tried to purchase 2 computers, and 4 Dooney & Burke bags with my card. They didn't authorize any of them, and they sent us new Discover cards. It does pay to be careful.

Sherry Starr

Eleven years ago when I had to make arrangements for my mother's funeral [burial plot, mortuary, etc etc, and she was being flown in from another state], I called my Citi credit card people to tell them where I would be going and spending money on, so they wouldn't have any conniption fits. Worked like a charm.

Often, if I know there will be some heavy usage, I will call them ahead and let them know so they flag my card for the usage. I give them specifics and will check in with them when out of town to be sure everything is okay.

Ginger in CA a verrry satisfied customer for over 25 yrs with them

Tiam Mary wrote: I assured the guy that I was me (I answered all those odd

When I moved from the US to the UK, I made a change of address with my Us credit union before moving - covering both my accounts and the credit card I had with them.

Three weeks later I got several letters in 2 days saying that they had (temporarily) closed my credit card, since there were some strange charges on it.

I had spent about $500 on furniture in IKEA!!! Obviously a computer made the alert, and no human bothered to look at it before they closed the card. But they were very quick to reopen it.

Later the same thing happened when I was on holiday in the US and suddenly using the card there...

Last Summer I had a double billing from a US hotel on my UK credit card, I called the hotel, it took them 10 min to figure out what had happened in their system, and they immediately returned the money - with a flunctuation in the exchange rate, I actually made about $5 on that (even after figuring in the phone call).

Hanne > I have a VISA debit card, and I don't use it all that much.

I got three fraudulent charge from Amazon just before Christmas... still waiting for those charges to be removed.

My DH travels on business and uses credit cards in some out of the way places. I can usually expect a call from Visa or Discover when he's on a trip, especially when he's in the Philippines.

I do the same when I am traveling outside the USA. I didn't think to do this the first time I left the States (trip to Tahiti) but the folks there contacted the MC company and we got everything straightened out. I was in the hotel gift shop and I think they had stuff like this happen all the time. It helps to have your passport handy so that you can prove your identity :-). The last time I called to let the credit card people know where I was going, the nice young man on the phone looked over my card activity for the last several years and told me that they don't flag out of country purchases for me anymore *unless* they are for a lot of money at one time OR are for non-touristy stuff -- I still call them anyway. I suppose if I was in Europe and tried to buy furniture or something like that, I would probably have trouble -- LOL! CiaoMeow >^;;^<

PAX, Tia Mary >^;;^< (RCTQ Queen of Kitties) Angels can't show their wings on earth but nothing was ever said about their whiskers! Visit my Photo albums at

The same thing happened to us a few years back and it was a mess to straighten out...I had somebody buying MP3 players form buy.com They did straighten it out but they used my last name and called them self Roger. They had the stuff shipped to Mailboxes ETC and I alerted them and so on. I was eventually credited back but I changed my account numbers. My husband watches our account every day. Pami

Luckily, my credit card usually calls me when I've made a big purchase to confirm it was me. Everytime so far, I have actually spent the money, but still I appreciate them checking.

A friend of mine had her entire bank account wiped out because she used her debit card (not credit card) to pay for a hotel room while on vacation. She knew the hotel that was the source of the problem, because it was a small place that still used the old method of sliding the receipt over the card, so they had her full credit card number. Eventually, she got her money back, but it was highly inconvenient to say the least. However, I do not keep a debit card precisely for this reason. With a credit card at least there is a buffer.

Glad your credit card company was so agreeable, Polly. Thanks for posting on this important subject.