I’m a victim of credit card fraud. Scammers had merchandise shipped to me so the bank says the charge is valid.

Guest post by Cc_fraud_throway_ugh

My dealings today have been frustrating enough I figure I should name and shame.

The bank is Barclays and the product involved is the AAdvantage Aviator Red MasterCard.

Not too long ago, I noticed some odd charges on one of my credit cards. Someone had made a couple of PayPal transactions for nearly $500. I checked my eBay and PayPal accounts and there was no recent activity. The card in question is on my PayPal account, but there had been no transactions in a good while since I don’t use either service much.

I called my bank and disputed the charges. They said they’d look into it and I’d probably see a credit soon. The credit soon posted, but in addition the merchandise from the fraudulent transactions was delivered to my home address with my name. The shipping labels had ‘eBay’ on them, so I called eBay. I gave them the USPS tracking numbers since sellers have to log those when shipping. They would only say that they couldn’t see any recent activity on my account and that I should contact my bank if there were unauthorized charges.

I opened a case with PayPal and told them that there were charges on a card added to my PayPal account, but no activity showing under my PayPal account and gave them the tracking numbers as well. PayPal responded that the account associated with the transaction was closed and that there hasn’t been any unauthorised access to my PayPal account. They also said to contact my bank to get refunded.

So the credits post and now I’m stuck with this merchandise I don’t want or need. eBay and PayPal wouldn’t put me in touch with the sellers to return it, so I sent letters to the return address on the packages. I said that they had sent me stuff I hadn’t ordered, and that it looked like someone had stolen my credit card number and had it shipped to me, and I imagine that the scammer had hoped to steal it from my doorstep, but couldn’t because the packages were left in a parcel locker. I told them I’d gladly give the merchandise back, and asked for a return shipping label and provided my email.

Nothing happens for several weeks. Today I got a call from my bank saying the merchant responded and they will reprocess the charges. I told the rep the story, but she said if I disagreed, I’d need to write a letter and ask them to reopen the case, and that they’d send me the info the merchant had sent them. She read notes that said something to the effect of ip location and purchase history were consistent with past activity.

Before the fraudulent charges, the last time I used the card was at my dentist’s office. I suspect someone there may be behind this. They have my personal info like address and SSN, so they could open accounts with my info. They’re also close to my home so they could easily go by and pick up packages from my front door if there were any there. I’ve read about similar ship to the fraud victims where a return label or ups pickup to get the item to the scammer shows up a couple of days later, but I haven’t seen anything like that.

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I still have the merchandise they sent me. It’s sitting in a box at home unused. I have no use for it and I’m happy to give it back to the seller. I just don’t want to pay expensive shipping fees to do so. How should I proceed? I’m thinking about going to the police station after work today to file a report and including that when I try to reopen the dispute.

Tl;Dr Someone stole my credit card info and had merchandise shipped to me. I disputed with the bank, but the bank is saying it looks like a legit charge.

Edit to add :This started 2 months ago. The reprocess call came yesterday. My account number was changed immediately and no other odd charges have shown up. I’ve checked my credit report and nothing else odd is there. I called the police this morning and filed a report.

Additional edit from reply below :

After being hung up on several times, I started the call saying that I intended to file a CFPB complaint if the issue wasn’t resolved in this call. One agent I spoke with even told me I just have to ship the stuff back at my own expense before the bank can do anything.

Eventually they transferred me to the ‘disputes’ department. Apparently ‘fraud’ is step one and ‘disputes’ is step 2. Fraud says that since the merchandise came to me and that I have a PayPal account, they can’t find in my favor. The disputes guy sounded like he was in an outsourced call center. He told me that I need to write a letter to reopen the case and that the bank can use that as evidence when going back to MasterCard to refute the info from the merchant.

I told them I intend to follow through with a CFPB complaint because I didn’t consider the issue resolved and that I had received conflicting information from previous reps. He said not to worry and that the bank always has my back. (It certainly doesn’t feel like it.)

Edit : To everyone saying contact eBay/PayPal/the seller — I’ve tried. eBay and PayPal say the transaction was not on my account so they can’t do anything and that I should contact my bank to be reimbursed. They won’t give info about transactions on accounts that I don’t control. I wrote letters to the sellers asking for return labels and they didn’t respond.

 

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