Credit card fraudulent activity.

[David071]

Hi everybody,
My wife and I travelled to Europe last October. While we were away our credit cards from the same bank were compromised and some thousands of dollars were taken out in fraudulent credit card transactions. Many months later we are trying to close the credit cards because of excessive fees on the cards. We are wondering if anybody else out there has been caught up with a bank with this predicament. The bank is saying they cannot close the credit card accounts until the overseas fraud is sorted out. We are just wondering how many months or years this can go on for and if you can go to an ombudsman to seek help or advice.

[mtv]

Has the bank reimbursed you for the fraudulent transactions?

I think almost a year is a reasonable time for the bank to have investigated the activity.

I'd run it past the ombudsman for advice.

[Downunder35m]

Even if they need to keep the account open they can stop the card and payment.
It is just another dirty trick to scam money from the customer.
But once the fraudulent payments have been sorted out and they should be after almost a year there is no reason to close it all.
Let me guess the bank starts with a big C ?

[Tiny]

I had my credit card identity compromised 5 years ago, when I reported it to ANZ Visa accounts they transferred me straight thru to the Visa Fraud Division who cancelled the card immediately while I was on the phone, issued a new card with a different account number that I received in the mail 3 days later.

In the mean time, they emailed me a special form, got me to fill out the form detailing all the fraudulent transactions, I faxed that to them & they reversed the transactions within a week. So I received all my fraudulently spent funds back.
As one of the large transactions was made to a New Zealand Co, it was an international transaction too, yet it was reversed same as the rest, including the foreign currency conversion fee.
That's the rules of credit cards, it is the duty of the Vendor to correctly establish the identity of the credit card user.

I'm surprised your bank didn't do the same.

That's where the Bank stops & the fun begins.
The entities who had the transactions reversed from them, started sending me overdue account letters, to which I replied & explained the above, then one of them put the debt in the hands of a debt collector who threatened me with legal action.
I contacted Legal Aid in my state by phone & received advice for free, that I was in the right & had no obligation to pay the debts, just to make sure I responded in writing to all communication from anyone seeking debt collection & to deny taking part in any of the transactions & that I had received Legal advice that I was not obliged to pay them, as above. Also to keep copy's of any correspondence in case it went to court.
They backed off immediately.

That was all over & done about 3 or 4 years ago now.

I have recently received a letter asking me to contact someone by phone regarding something private & confidential, no other details or identification of who they are or what they want; I Googled the phone number & it was a legal firm specialising in, you guessed it, debt collection. Not the same one as above.
Since there was no substance to the letter I have ignored it until they give me something I need to reply to with my standard response.

Hope that helps, just my experience.

[David071]

Thanks everybody for your support.
Just to bring you up to speed with the timeline of our issues with "The Bank." My wife and I both had our credit cards compromised in October 2013 in Europe. In January the bank rung me and said my credit card had been compromised and 3 transactions of a fairly large amount were made and that they had put a stop on the credit card. In March my wife's card was also compromised and her card was stopped also.
I rang my bank today trying to cancel the card because of excessive fees and they said to me that the credit card cannot be cancelled because they were still investigating into the January fraudulent transactions even though we had obviously different card numbers.
What I don't like is they are holding us to ransom over the January fraud transactions. I thought once the transactions were stopped things were between the bank fraud department and the fraudsters. Surely the bank should have sorted things out by now? Until the bank sort things out - I don't know how long they are going to take - we are not allowed to close the account!

[mtv]

As Tiny pointed out, the bank should have cancelled the cards and issued new ones, which would enable the account to continue as normal, allowing you to do what ever you wanted with the account... including cancelling it.

If the bank isn't being cooperative, then it's time to talk to the banking ombudsman.

[Downunder35m]

Agreed!
The only reason for the bank not to cancel the cards is to make money with them.
Copy the paperwork, give it to the ombudsman and make an official report.
Ususally I already speeds things up massively if you just mention that you contacted the ombudsmand for legal advise on your situation.
For every reported incident that the ombudsman takes any action, the bank has to pay a few thausand dollars in fees if fund guilty.
Should be not too hard to get the cards canceled and back dated to the first day you were resfused to cancel them.

Problem is that once a credit card is fully cancelled the account is no longer available in the system.
If someone now makes a claim on this card the bank has a hard time finding the correspondig details.
As Tiny pointed out it can take ages for those scammed companies to accept the loss of money.
Your bank might be doing the right thing to keep you out of trouble by blocking payment requests, but then again after sucha long time you shoulr receive the debt letters personally by now.
In any case it shows a very poor service from your bank...

[Tiny]

I rang my bank today trying to cancel the card because of excessive fees and they said to me that the credit card cannot be cancelled because they were still investigating into the January fraudulent transactions even though we had obviously different card numbers.

What do you mean by excessive fees?
Account keeping fees or interest?

If it's high interest; pay down the credit card balance every month & no interest, that's how I use my card.

It works out cheaper to get a personal loan or draw back on your mortgage equity than to pay credit card interest. I don't use either of these facilities, however that's what I would do if I had a large credit card debt that I didn't have the funds to pay off.

Apart from that I get charged an annual fee of $26 + $10 extra(wife's) card + reward program fee $42 each card - $84 Total=$120 per annum.

To counteract that I get Visa reward points (instead of frequent flyer points) for using my cards, averaging $200 per annum, which I take as cash back to my account, giving me a net profit of ~$80 for using my cards.

Sorry, I just don't understand how anyone could have excessive credit card fees unless they poorly manage their account or they are with the wrong Bank/Credit card.

[Downunder35m]

Still don't knowwhy we have to pay fees for them if you get fee free cards in other countries for many years...

[gordon_s1942]

Still don't knowwhy we have to pay fees for them if you get fee free cards in other countries for many years...

Because they are thieving bastards who milk every customer all they can.
My wife drew a sum from a savings account she has which is not accessible via an ATM and they charged her $8.50 because it was an 'Over the Counter' withdrawal.

I got caught ONCE when I paid a bill by BPay at the Post Office using EFTPOS and withdrew some cash only to find out on my Bank statement that the APO is considered a branch of a bank and I got charged a fee as the cash withdrawal was considered an 'Over the Counter' transaction.

[David071]

Hi Tiny and everybody,
My wife and I are charged $199.00 for the main card and $90.00 for the second credit card. We only achieved 48,000 points last year which equaled to what we were charged for the cards. The only benefit for us is we can use it as a credit card and not be using cash. We just don't have the spending capacity for what we are charged for the cards.

[Downunder35m]

200$ for a credit card is exessive!
I mean even for a gold card it would not be worth it once you add the normal fees they love to charge for everything down here.
Do yourself a favour and contact the ombudsman in the matter, it is understandable that someone would like to cancel a card with such high fees and your bank is not playing a fair game with you.

[Tiny]

+1 for that Downunder35m, that is excessive. You should get some advice from the ombudsman or legal aid as to where you stand.

Don't suppose you care to name & shame the Bank.

[admin]

Points are a just a scam to get you to spend money.

You can buy a rechargeable credit card from supermarkets and the post office these day. You can also get a low interest card from the major banks , it just doesnt have the points and other bells and whistles.

Dont pay a fortune for what you dont really need.

[hughdman]

Points are a just a scam to get you to spend money.

You can buy a rechargeable credit card from supermarkets and the post office these day. You can also get a low interest card from the major banks , it just doesnt have the points and other bells and whistles.

Dont pay a fortune for what you dont really need.

Credit cards are great if you are disciplined enough to use them.
We pay ours off each month and whack everything on to them providing there is no surcharge, try with amex forst then use visa (amex = double points)
Our credit cards are a package costs $300 and we receive fee free savings accounts, discounted home loans and free travel insurance if we pay via credit card.

We also convert our points to cashback and receive $1200 a year,

Commonsense is needed.

[hughdman]

There are also credit cards out there, where if you buy something and the price goes down, you can claim the difference.

[David071]

Hi everybody,
Good news regarding our bank fraud problem. The bank manager spoke to us today and said that the fraud problem with our cards had been sorted finally - after about eight months! Things would have been better if the fraud department of the bank had put the paperwork through when things were sorted rather than after my wife and I had gone through more problems trieng to close our credit cards. In the end the bank has reduced significantly the yearly fees we have to pay to use the credit cards. Thanks and appreciation to all the comments on this forum regarding this situation.