CHICO — Spirits aren’t high on this end today folks as my bank account, as of writing this, is $900 down thanks to what my bank suspects to be a card skimmer situation.
That’s right, the man who writes a weekly scam column got scammed.
I had a great time on Saturday at the mall in Roseville with some friends for a birthday celebration but as I went out to dinner that night my card was rejected. As I jumped on my US Bank app, a text message popped up on my phone from my bank warning me about a $300 charge for an Apple gift card. I replied “no” to the text which asked me if that was authorized, then continued to my account information page on my phone to be safe.
Sure enough, I had two pending transactions, one to Apple for $300 and one to the United States Postal Service for $600. It almost felt like the fish at the sushi restaurant were having a better night than me.
Thankfully, I called up the number on the back of my debit card and was able to sort some of it out in just short of an hour with my bank’s fraud department. Apparently, within a surprisingly small two-hour window, the person who nabbed my card information had attempted to make about four different Apple purchases as well that were blocked. As for the two pending charges, I’m eagerly awaiting my phone call back from the fraud department for a reversal.
This is a long-winded and honestly humbling way to give a warning this week. Keep a close eye on what stores you shop at whether you are home or out of town and regularly monitor your bank account. If you can get your bank’s app on your phone, I highly suggest that because frankly, this could have been a lot worse had I not noticed the same day.
This process is looking like it’s going to be a hassle and I currently am without a debit card until it gets sorted out, but man I’m grateful that the person was halted from using my card.
Stay safe out there folks and let’s all dream of a day where these creeps finally get some justice.
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Scam of the Week generally runs every Tuesday. Readers are welcome to contact reporter Jake Hutchison to report scams and potential scams they have come in contact with by calling 828-1329 or via email at [email protected].
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