Someone stole $900 from our checking acct

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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Someone stole my wife's debit card, she noticed it was gone last night at dinner. Checked our account online and $900 gone, called the bank this morning, signed affadivit papers saying the money was unauthorized, froze our account. Bank says that all the money will be reimbursed once it hits the account on monday. Anyone have this happen to them with their bank? Anything else I should do that I haven't?
 

ElFenix

Elite Member
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Mar 20, 2000
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well at least you're not directly taking the hit
 

NogginBoink

Diamond Member
Feb 17, 2002
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Ensure nothing else is missing from your wife's purse.

Thankfully, thieves can't do a whole lot of damage to your identity with just a debit card.

You are lucky though: the bank is not obligated to reimburse you.
 

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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Not yet, what this bank says and what it does have yet to be determined. It was our joint account that we pay all the bills from. The bank claims that companies that the charges were through are going to have to reimburse us and not the bank itself.
 

phatj

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Mar 21, 2003
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The bank is going to investigate further into this, yes? Or are they just gonna hand you ur 900 back
 

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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I would imagine they will investigate further, these charges are for places we have never gone to and they are duplicate amounts. They went to the same stores and charged the same thing in a different town

EDIT: Its 6 charges all together, a sports store twice, CVS twice, hair salon and a gas station
 

ivol07

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Jun 25, 2002
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What bank do you have. Someone got my debit card number and started charging things on my account and it was quickly refunded. This was with Washington Mutual. But keep in mind this was for around $200.
 

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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Originally posted by: ivol07
What bank do you have. Someone got my debit card number and started charging things on my account and it was quickly refunded. This was with Washington Mutual. But keep in mind this was for around $200.

We are in the middle of switching banks to a larger bank, but its a small community bank unfortunately.

 

MrYogi

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Mar 15, 2003
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Did the theif withdraw $900 using a debit card? ATM allows only $500. Even if it was used to buy something, won't the thief need the PIN?
 

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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there were no cash withdrawals it was all store purchases, Visa check/debit card.
 

neovan

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Mar 8, 2001
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Originally posted by: alm99
I would imagine they will investigate further, these charges are for places we have never gone to and they are duplicate amounts. They went to the same stores and charged the same thing in a different town

EDIT: Its 6 charges all together, a sports store twice, CVS twice, hair salon and a gas station

the culprit(s) might know someone in the store and just rang up the card. sorry to hear of this. hope everything gets cleared.
 

ivol07

Golden Member
Jun 25, 2002
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Originally posted by: alm99
Originally posted by: ivol07
What bank do you have. Someone got my debit card number and started charging things on my account and it was quickly refunded. This was with Washington Mutual. But keep in mind this was for around $200.

We are in the middle of switching banks to a larger bank, but its a small community bank unfortunately.

I'm sure the process is the same. For me they refunded the money along with a letter saying that if the investigation turns up that it was not fraud we will have to pay the money back. Then about a month later another letter saying that it was fraud and everything is fine. Hopefully it's the same smooth process for you, good luck.
 

technogeeky

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Dec 13, 2000
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If they use the card as a credit card, then all the person has to do is sign. Nobody ever checks signatures, so that's probably what happend.

If he/she didn't know the PIN, they can't get banking money or use it as debit.
 

alm99

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Apr 16, 2000
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Originally posted by: technogeeky
If they use the card as a credit card, then all the person has to do is sign. Nobody ever checks signatures, so that's probably what happend.

If he/she didn't know the PIN, they can't get banking money or use it as debit.

Right and thats what we think/know what happened, since no one does verify signatures or id.
 

MrYogi

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Mar 15, 2003
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They used it to buy stuff? They will be caught for sure. Thats what Video Cameras are for.
 

isekii

Lifer
Mar 16, 2001
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some pos bought stuff from childrens warehouse on my debit card.

they sent me an affidavit to sign and i got the credits back.
 

psianime

Golden Member
Mar 16, 2002
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I've had money stolen from my debit card before. Now I NEVER use by debit card for anything, I only use my credit card which seems to have a lot more protection.
 

Spamela

Diamond Member
Oct 30, 2000
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umm, report it to the police?

someone stole some of mrs. spamela's checks & cleaned out her bank account.
the police caught the people (thanks to OUR efforts), the DA gave them a slap
on the wrist, and we're still dealing with the consequences 2 years later.
 

Sepen

Diamond Member
Oct 9, 1999
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My wifes purse was stolen last year and they cleaned out her debit-credit card for $650 and mine for $500. We got the money back pronto and they did investigate.
All of the purchases were made at sneaker stores within an hour, and they even had them on video. But no arrests were ever made as far as we know. The people were definately not Italian and how they were never asked for proof was beyond my reasoning.
 

Dari

Lifer
Oct 25, 2002
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if you have a debit card, you should only put money in your checking account when you need to use it. otherwise, keep it empty. once stolen, the thief can/will have a field day with your checking account. Plus, they would need your PIN to do a transfer. There are millions of atms that allow anyone to do free transfers (from checking to savings and vice-versa).

Remember people, it's the little steps that can prevent big crises like this.
 

alm99

Diamond Member
Apr 16, 2000
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We are in the process of switching banks before this happened and are going to have our joint account for paying bills with no debit cards and then our personal accounts. We were doing this to prevent something like this from happening, but it got us before this coming week when we would close the account that was stolen from. Man this sucks. I hate having to wait till monday to see if the willl refund fully
 

leung324

Banned
Apr 29, 2003
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this is why I don't keep more than $300 in my checking account. debit is less protected than credit card
 

J1600B

Senior member
Nov 15, 2002
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Somebody got my credit card number and tried to order just under $3,000 worth of laptops from an online company. Some dude in Hawaii.