Tag: fraud

Uber/Lyft Drivers Have A New Way To Scam Customers & I Think It’s The Most Despicable One Yet

Joe is a fan of Uber and Lyft. I am not. My main concern used to only be if I had to take a ride-sharing ride by myself. I’m a female and, at 4’6″ tall, a pint-sized one, at that. So I just never felt safe taking a ride without someone else with me.

Unfortunately, even if you’re the type of person to follow the seven rules of being a good Uber/Lyft passenger, drivers have figured out ways to try to get more money from their ride customers. One of our Uber drivers in Las Vegas tried to screw us by taking a longer route, which caused our bill to go from $20 something to $40 something. We also wrote about drivers around the world who were falsely reporting their customers made a mess in their car – it’s called Vomit Fraud. Now there’s apparently this new thing that may be making the rounds:

Continue reading “Uber/Lyft Drivers Have A New Way To Scam Customers & I Think It’s The Most Despicable One Yet”

Arrrrrgh – A Hacked Credit Card Cost Me Points!!

Whether you’re a points and miles person, a cash back type or even if you only use a debit card, getting your card hacked eventually happens to everyone. Since I have a good amount of cards, I keep a close tab on my accounts looking for any unfamiliar charges. It makes it pretty hard for Sharon to surprise me with any presents, ’cause I see the charge before I get the gift, but that’s a trade-off I’m willing to make.

Back in November, I saw two separate $300 Ticketmaster charges for Orlando Magic tickets on my Sapphire Reserve. We’re not sportsing people and the charges weren’t ours, but since we live in Orlando, Chase’s systems didn’t flag them as fraudulent charges. I went online, filled out the form saying I didn’t make these charges (yay for no direct human contact) and was informed the charges would be removed. They canceled my card, sent me a replacement and a mailer to send back the indestructible metal card. I thought that was the end of the story, and it was, until now.

Continue reading “Arrrrrgh – A Hacked Credit Card Cost Me Points!!”

Darth Vader On A Plane, When Your Points Are Stolen, More Bad News On The Marriott Hack & More…

Happy Sunday (and happy New Year!) to all of our travel friends, both near and far! Here are some articles we’ve read from other bloggers (and other sources) that we think you may like, as well, so we’re passing them along.

Continue reading “Darth Vader On A Plane, When Your Points Are Stolen, More Bad News On The Marriott Hack & More…”

How To Prepare Yourself Against Credit Card Hacks

Nowadays, having your credit card number stolen is one of the most annoying things that can happen (well, except for someone stealing an Amazon.com package from your front porch). Credit card fraud used to be something you heard about on the news or maybe you had a friend who had their debit card number stolen and couldn’t get money out of the bank until everything was straightened out. Those days are long gone. Credit fraud is happening to everyone and the more cards you have, the greater the chance you’re eventually going have to deal with it.

Let’s look at the evolution of credit card theft and what you can do today to protect yourself from the bad guys:

Continue reading “How To Prepare Yourself Against Credit Card Hacks”

Chip + PIN Cards; Why You Should Have One

By now, I’m sure you have a credit card with a chip, or EMV chip to be specific, in your possession. It’s that thing on your card that makes the person at the checkout tell you, “You need to use your chip in the bottom thingie,” or makes them say when you try to insert your chip card, “We don’t use that chip thing yet, so you need to swipe your card.”

amex-everyday-preferred
That thing on the left side of the card is the “chip”

In the U.S.A., we like the think we lead the world in just about everything, but when it comes to credit card security we are decades behind the curve. EMV ( Europay, Mastercard and Visa) chip technology was introduced back in the 1990s and rolled out throughout Europe in the 2000s. The chip in the card is used to confirm the information instead of reading the information off the magnetic strip on the back. This technology is harder to counterfeit and, supposedly, cuts down on fraud. The banks in Europe rolled out this technology first because credit card fraud was, at the time, much more common there. When the chip cards were introduced and helped prevent fraud, the criminals went to the least protected market, the USA, so they could continue with the scamming. Lucky us.

Continue reading “Chip + PIN Cards; Why You Should Have One”