Credit fraud

About a year ago somehow someone got ahold of my debit card number but before they could charge anything on it my bank reported the card stolen and shut the account down. Of course I didn't find this out untill I went to use my card at the ATM and it sucked the card in on me but that's a whole other story.

Anyhow around Christmas time I recieved a letter in the mail from a computer company saying that my card was rejected and the order of almost 850 dollars could not be placed untill I called them with another card number or pther payment method. I never placed such an order so I called that company and they gave me the number of my old credit card number that was given to them. This guy was still trying to use the card!!

The company was good about it and said I didn't owe them anything so I called the bank and asked if there was something I could do about this person still trying to use my card. They said since the account was shut down(I closed my account with that bank after that mess) and the card was no good who ever was doing couldn't charge anything and said there was no way of stopping the person from trying to use it.

I was worried about any charges that would be owed would go on my credit report but the bank assured me that nothing could be charged.

So today I get a letter in the mail from AOL saying that I owed them almost 50 dollars and my account was being shut down until I paid. I don't have an account with AOL so I called them right up and explained the letter I recieved. The rep asked me if I had reported a card stolen within the past year and I told her yes. She put me on hold for a bit and when she came back she said everything is cleared up and I don't owe them any money. I asked if someone was trying to use that card again and she said it's possible but she couldn't give out that information.

So now I'm worried that someone is still trying to use the card and I'm worried that something like that would go against my credit. Help!!

What a pain in the neck, Jessica. Obviously it can cause you a hassle. When the truth makes itself known, no one can blame you, but you might have more incidents like the AOL one. The card should have been rejected immediately upon its being run through, so how they charged anything is beyond me.

I can't answer any questions about credit but I wanted to mention that I have heard some people go through garbage cans and sanitary landfills looking for credit card and bank account information. I never throw away anything that contains that information without first putting it through a paper shredder.

Lorie, now that I know things like that can happen I shred everything into teenie tiny little bits. I also before shredding them I black out any important information with a pen. You can never be too careful.

When you get credit card offers, in the mail, shred them, too. People can get them and fill them out and get cards, in your name. Here, in Tucson, we have a problem with druggies taking bill payments out of mailboxes, altering the payee and amount and cashing them. We mail all of our bills from a public mailbox.

Badhabit, you should notify the credit bureaus ( Equifax etc ) about this so you can be sure your credit won't be affected. Its important to catch it before it happens rather than after. Its harder to fix after the damage has been done.