How many times have you had to replace a credit card due to fraudulent charges?

[Michael in ABQ]

I just got an automated call from the fraud prevention line for one of my credit cards. A couple of pending $90 online charges I didn't make from PLACE D MARCHE - sounds French. So I had them cancel the card, dispute the charges, and send me a new one.

This got me thinking, I've never considered myself a victim of identity theft but over the ~20 years I've had credit cards I've had to get one replaced due to fraudulent charges (and presumably compromised card number) at least 6-7 times, maybe more. This particular card is one I use for a side business and pretty much just a few automated bills and buying inventory from a couple local suppliers every month or two. It's my oldest card but until a year or two ago I only used it once a year just to keep it active and contributing to my good credit score. I recently made two online purchases from new merchants for some office furniture and I can't help but think those may have been how my card number was compromised. Then again it could be something else entirely. I use credit cards for most purchases in person and online and there are presumably numerous opportunities over the years for my number to be stolen.



So am I the outlier or is this fairly common to suddenly have your credit card number compromised and have to get it replaced? How many times has this happened to you in your lifetime?

[ctuser1]

I have had it happen 3 or 4 times long time ago (i.e. before 2014 or so) - but none since all cards moved to chip.

My understanding is that these fraudulent charges (most of the time from overseas) were more common with the older magnetic-only cards.

[MilesTeg]

I just got an automated call from the fraud prevention line for one of my credit cards. A couple of pending $90 online charges I didn't make from PLACE D MARCHE - sounds French. So I had them cancel the card, dispute the charges, and send me a new one.

This got me thinking, I've never considered myself a victim of identity theft but over the ~20 years I've had credit cards I've had to get one replaced due to fraudulent charges (and presumably compromised card number) at least 6-7 times, maybe more. This particular card is one I use for a side business and pretty much just a few automated bills and buying inventory from a couple local suppliers every month or two. It's my oldest card but until a year or two ago I only used it once a year just to keep it active and contributing to my good credit score. I recently made two online purchases from new merchants for some office furniture and I can't help but think those may have been how my card number was compromised. Then again it could be something else entirely. I use credit cards for most purchases in person and online and there are presumably numerous opportunities over the years for my number to be stolen.



So am I the outlier or is this fairly common to suddenly have your credit card number compromised and have to get it replaced? How many times has this happened to you in your lifetime?

I've only had one incident in ~20 years. I'm pretty sure from a skimmer at a gas station. My DP has never had an incident.

I've never worried to much about it. I don't compartmentalize cards or anything, but I also don't frequently make purchases from just any online place.

[nereo]

It's happened to us 3x in roughly 20 years.  Each time we are pretty certain the culprit was at a restaurant (skimmer).  One of the reasons I'm still shocked that in teh US they take the card away from you into the back... everywhere else I've traveled in the last decade they bring the card reader right to the table.

Each time the fraudlent charges were dropped and the hassle was 'annoying but manageable'.  we had new cards in the mail within 48 hours and it took about an hour to change all our auto-pay functions online.  No hits to our credit score.

[AccidentialMustache]

I can't count how many times DW's discover has been replaced. At least three of them were where a national/regional name brand retail got compromised on their backend and sometimes we got the new card before there were charges and sometimes not. Home Depot, Target, Schnucks... probably more I'm forgetting.

For a while there we were averaging 6 months on that card. It has slowed down some but not entirely in the last couple of years.

[chemistk]

It's only ever happened to me twice, and both times it ended up being a somewhat positive experience.

First time, I was in college and I got a call from my bank (a local, tellers know your name style bank) that I had made a suspicious charge on my account. Unfortunately it was a debit card that was used to make the charge, so they couldn't reimburse me but they did tell me that it was made at Amazon. I checked my statement and called Amazon and they, without question, sent me a check (I think...this was some time ago) covering the difference.

Second time was a couple years ago, i got an alert from Capital One's app asking me to verify a suspicious charge. I've never spent more than maybe $100 on shoes, so buying $275 worth of shoes from the Nike site definitely wasn't me. Interestingly, Capital One reversed the charge, and then about a week later I received a merchant credit from Nike for the amount that was originally "stolen".

[FIREisCOOL]

It has happened to me numerous times.  The funniest one is when someone used my card number was used to purchase an $800 plane ticket to Dubai.  We are pretty sure it was from someone working on the cruise ship we were on at the time (we were alerted to the fraudulent transaction when we were at a restaurant in one of the ports on our cruise and our card was declined) since that was the card we had on file with the ship for the trip.  Luckily, we had other cards with us and could pay using those (since we couldn't get a replacement card sent to us while we were out of the country). 

[YttriumNitrate]

I have had it happen 3 or 4 times long time ago (i.e. before 2014 or so) - but none since all cards moved to chip.
My understanding is that these fraudulent charges (most of the time from overseas) were more common with the older magnetic-only cards.

About a year ago, I had to get a chip based card replaced. The chip worked fine, but was bypassed by using the swipe functionality.

[RetiredAt63]

Many years ago, initiated by the bank issuing the card.  They didn't give details, just that a retailer I had shopped at had a compromised situation.  I think I know the company, since they were in the news for compromised cards at the same time.

[MilesTeg]

I have had it happen 3 or 4 times long time ago (i.e. before 2014 or so) - but none since all cards moved to chip.
My understanding is that these fraudulent charges (most of the time from overseas) were more common with the older magnetic-only cards.

About a year ago, I had to get a chip based card replaced. The chip worked fine, but was bypassed by using the swipe functionality.

It's sad that in the U.S. we decided to say to hell with real chip+pin.

[Michael in ABQ]

From memory these are some of the things people have tried to buy with my credit cards.

$1.00 song on iTunes (obviously testing to see if it would work with a small charge) followed by a subscription to Match.com.

A TV at Best Buy in California (never lived there).

Some makeup and a $100 digital gift card from Walmart.com. The the makeup actually got delivered to our house. They got away with the $100 gift card to some random letter and number Yahoo email address (I was surprised the fraud department person at Walmart actually gave me the details). It ended up being a hassle to send the makeup back to Walmart because it was considered HAZMAT.

[PoutineLover]

It's only happened to me once in 11 years of having credit cards and I usually have at least 4 active at any given time. I noticed a fraudulent charge for several hundred dollars from Walmart (which I basically never shop at, and definitely not for such a huge purchase). I called the fraud prevention line and they replaced my card and made me sign a statement saying that I was not responsible for the charge.

[AerynLee]

It happens to me every couple of years or so, so probably 8+ times in 16 years. It actually happened twice in the last year on the same account. So far it's never been a hassle for me, I call up the bank (or report through the app now that that's a thing), charges are provisionally reversed and then I get a notice a month or two later saying they've investigated it and found that I am not liable for the charges. I only have one card that anything is autopaid on and that's all I use it for so there's no hassle to update autopays.

The instances that stand out:

• The first one (when I was 18-20) my bank called me and said someone tried using my debit card for three separate charges all over $1000...in Albania. They denied the charges, canceled my card and were sending me a new one
• I had a <$40 charge at a car dealership in Tennessee (which I've never been to) and when I called them up they could tell me the make, model, and color of the car they did work on
• DH had a weird one that I never fully understood but he ended up with so many debits and credits on his account we had to use a spreadsheet to make sure it all zeroed out
• After trying out a small chain restaurant with only one employee who was very high I ended up with three $5 charges that just said "Square" as the merchant plus the actual charge from the restaurant. I don't actually know that they are related but I'm not inclined to go back

[LiveLean]

It's become an annual event. The chip doesn't seem to help. I just keep a list of all of the accounts I need to change with the new card. Routine takes about 45 minutes. Sign of the times.

[Buffaloski Boris]

My credit union is downright militant on credit card security. I once got a call from them to verify a gasoline charge before I even left the station.

So far just one fraud item which required a card replacement. A small charge at a redbox. The credit union denied the charge and contacted me within a few minutes.

[Sibley]

I used to have a lot of issues when I traveled for work and used personal cc. Since I don't do that anymore, it's much less.

[economista]

I've had it happen twice. The first time I was in college and I got a call from the card company to verify if I had made an $1100 purchase at Quicksilver Surf Shop. Nope - this is when my entire monthly budget was less than $1000! Discover reversed the charge and sent me a new card.

The second time was really weird. On a Friday night I got groceries at Safeway for around $60. Then on Saturday morning I got a call from the card company and my card was used at that same Safeway store for 10 transactions the previous night! There was my initial $60 charge and then charges for $21, $121, $221, $321, $421, etc. all the way up to $921. It was definitely a store employee, and I still don't know how they did it. That store didn't have self checkout so I used one of the credit card readers at the normal checkout counter and didn't notice anything weird about it. There must have been some kind of skimmer on it, and then the employee ran my number manually over and over again and each time a charge was approved they increased by $100. So odd. The credit card company (I think it was Chase this time) was totally understanding and said it was obviously fraudulent so they reversed the charges and then sent me a new card.

[ketchup]

Probably about three times total and I've been using credit cards for about ten years.

I've gotten a good amount of false alarms though.  But we do some weird shit.

I swiped my Citi card at a gas pump in a small ski town in the middle of nowhere CO in the middle of the night (during a road trip from CA to IL), was declined, and immediately my phone blew up with an email, a text, and an automated phone call.  I swiped my Discover at every gas pump on the way from IL to TX in the space of 18 hours, and then got declined trying to check into our hotel in TX.

[FireLane]

It seems to happen to me about once a year. In fact, I had to replace my Capital One Savor card just last month when someone used it to send themselves money on Venmo and then tried to charge $400 of groceries. I've never been sure who's stealing my card or how, but really, it could be anyone who handles it. The chip doesn't do much, since you can order anything online with just the number.

Banks could easily make this more secure, but they don't want to put even the smallest hurdle in the way of people getting themselves into credit-card debt. They accept fraudulent charges and write-offs as a cost of doing business.

[MilesTeg]

It's become an annual event. The chip doesn't seem to help. I just keep a list of all of the accounts I need to change with the new card. Routine takes about 45 minutes. Sign of the times.

The chip would help if it were implemented as intended. That is, swipes and chip only transactions not allowed.

But people complained about having to remember Pins, and businesses complained about having the proper hardware.

[John Galt incarnate!]

I just got an automated call from the fraud prevention line for one of my credit cards. A couple of pending $90 online charges I didn't make from PLACE D MARCHE - sounds French. So I had them cancel the card, dispute the charges, and send me a new one.

This got me thinking, I've never considered myself a victim of identity theft but over the ~20 years I've had credit cards I've had to get one replaced due to fraudulent charges (and presumably compromised card number) at least 6-7 times, maybe more. This particular card is one I use for a side business and pretty much just a few automated bills and buying inventory from a couple local suppliers every month or two. It's my oldest card but until a year or two ago I only used it once a year just to keep it active and contributing to my good credit score. I recently made two online purchases from new merchants for some office furniture and I can't help but think those may have been how my card number was compromised. Then again it could be something else entirely. I use credit cards for most purchases in person and online and there are presumably numerous opportunities over the years for my number to be stolen.



So am I the outlier or is this fairly common to suddenly have your credit card number compromised and have to get it replaced? How many times has this happened to you in your lifetime?

2 X

One card was replaced due to its unauthorized  use for a fraudulent purchase.

One card was replaced because the seller was hacked.

[LetItGrow]

I just got an automated call from the fraud prevention line for one of my credit cards. A couple of pending $90 online charges I didn't make from PLACE D MARCHE - sounds French. So I had them cancel the card, dispute the charges, and send me a new one.

This got me thinking, I've never considered myself a victim of identity theft but over the ~20 years I've had credit cards I've had to get one replaced due to fraudulent charges (and presumably compromised card number) at least 6-7 times, maybe more. This particular card is one I use for a side business and pretty much just a few automated bills and buying inventory from a couple local suppliers every month or two. It's my oldest card but until a year or two ago I only used it once a year just to keep it active and contributing to my good credit score. I recently made two online purchases from new merchants for some office furniture and I can't help but think those may have been how my card number was compromised. Then again it could be something else entirely. I use credit cards for most purchases in person and online and there are presumably numerous opportunities over the years for my number to be stolen.



So am I the outlier or is this fairly common to suddenly have your credit card number compromised and have to get it replaced? How many times has this happened to you in your lifetime?

2 X

One card was replaced due to its unauthorized  use for a fraudulent purchase.

One card was replaced because the seller was hacked.

Saved me typing, this is my experience also.

[MyAlterEgoIsTaller]

Just once so far, about 15 years ago.  The scammer bought several thousand dollars worth of digital cameras and gift cards in a Walmart in another state.  The card company required me to file a police report and send them the report number.  The local police officer seemed very suspicious of me, on the basis that it was only a 3-hour drive to that Walmart, and/or I could have loaned the card to someone.  I was accounted for at work at the time, and Walmart probably has cameras that could establish it wasn't me, and the card was in my possession the whole time and I used it locally during that same day, at a time that would have made it impossible for me and the card to also have made it to the other state in time for the fraudulent transaction, so it all seemed like unnecessary police drama, but the card company undid the charges of course.

[the_fixer]

More times than I can count, always the same bank same brand of card. My other cards have never had the issue.

Latest one was a card that has never even been taken out of my locking drawer at home (since the last time they replaced it) still attached to the paper (I do not think I even activated the card) it came with yet they claim it must have been used and skimmed at a gas station.

I asked them to tell me the last charge I made on it and they agree the card has never been used other than the fraudulent charges. They basically said oh well we will just replace it... that card is getting canceled ASAP.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Zamboni]

^That's interesting!

Now that I think about it, I have a bunch of cards and most of them have never been compromised.

But, my work-issued pcard has been reissued about every two years due to fraud, and several colleagues have had the same issue. Personally I think it is an inside job . . . someone in the Corporate Card Office, or perhaps an IT person with admin access to the information.

I've also had someone try to take cards out in my name, and they had information like my birthdate and social security number. Equifax breach, perhaps? In any case, I now have a credit freeze in place at all 3 credit reporting agencies. That'll be a pain if I try to refi my mortgage shortly because I'll have to jump through some hoops to unfreeze those, but otherwise I never even think about it any more.

[FireLane]

I've also had someone try to take cards out in my name, and they had information like my birthdate and social security number. Equifax breach, perhaps? In any case, I now have a credit freeze in place at all 3 credit reporting agencies. That'll be a pain if I try to refi my mortgage shortly because I'll have to jump through some hoops to unfreeze those, but otherwise I never even think about it any more.

That happened to me too. In addition to getting my credit card numbers stolen, someone once opened a credit card in my name, maxed it out and abandoned it. I only found out when I started getting angry letters from the bank saying I owed interest and penalties. That was a pain to unwind.

After that, I froze my credit at all the credit agencies. FYI, there are actually four now. The fourth one is Innovis.

[MyAlterEgoIsTaller]

I haven't had anybody take new cards out in my name (yet), but recently somebody filed an application for a Payroll Protection Program loan with my company name and my info - it didn't go through, because I keep a fraud alert on my account because of the past cc theft - but I'm still trying to get the inquiry taken off my credit report. 

Somebody (possibly same scammer as above) also filed an unemployment claim using my info, with different email and direct deposit #.  I found out about that because my HR person wanted to know why I was trying to get unemployment while still employed.

A year or so ago a somebody scammed this same HR person into changing my paycheck direct deposit info, by using a spoofed email to request our official company form for that, and returning it filled out with new info.  I found out about that before any money was actually mis-directed, because I had an alert set up on the payroll processing company's website.

[kanga1622]

I've had mine replaced twice that I can remember in the last 20 years.

[Zamboni]

After that, I froze my credit at all the credit agencies. FYI, there are actually four now. The fourth one is Innovis.

Oh, jeez, just froze my credit report with them as well. Thank you, @FireLane, for the heads up!

It annoys me to no end that these credit reporting companies profit off of obtaining and storing my private personal information without my consent. What a messed up system.

[nereo]

After that, I froze my credit at all the credit agencies. FYI, there are actually four now. The fourth one is Innovis.

Oh, jeez, just froze my credit report with them as well. Thank you, @FireLane, for the heads up!

It annoys me to no end that these credit reporting companies profit off of obtaining and storing my private personal information without my consent. What a messed up system.

There's a number of legislative steps which could protect an individual's data, but to date the United States (and specifically Congress) has failed to pass any comprehensive digital privacy protection acts.  The EU - while still not as robust as I'd like - has much better protection for individuals under the  ePrivacy Directive (2002) and General Data Protection Regulation (2016).

Simply put, our legislation has not kept up with the speed and complexity at which firms can harvest our personal information and use it largely without our consent or knowledge.

[I'm a red panda]

At least 2-3 times a year.

[CupcakeGuru]

At least 10 times. Just received a new card after $700 in amazon charges.

[socaso]

I feel that it happens at a rate of one of our cards (we have 3-4) every other year. It just happened a couple of months ago. Usually the fraudulent charges are small but this time someone tried to charge $700.

[soccerluvof4]

I marked never but just recalled it did happen once about a year ago. So if you want to change that on your poll

[Michael in ABQ]

So the charges that just occurred appear to be from Nigeria. My credit union already credited my card for the two $90 charges plus the associated international service fees.

[thesis]

Happened to me for the the first time just a few weeks ago :-(

I login to my account almost daily and noticed two suspicious <$1 pending transactions. I called the bank immediately and got that all sorted out, but it took a week for a new card to arrive. Fortunately, none of my bills were scheduled to charge during that time (I could have used my debit card, I guess), and then had to go through switching everything to the new card. What a pain. Sad, too, because I had that number memorized by heart. RIP. Now I keep wondering how in the heck my card info got stolen, but oh well. I caught it super early, and I think my bank is happy for that.

Yeah, not a fan of the whole credit system.

[Metalcat]

Never for me, but DH had it happen once a few years ago.

[Dicey]

My answer should be 2+. The + is the interesting one. Remember when telephone plans came with calling cards? I changed providers (MCI perhaps?) and they sent a new card. The number was all 1's and 0's. I called and asked for a different number, but they wouldn't budge. Couple of months later, the phone bill was so fat it hardly fit in my apartment size mailbox. Crazy high bill. I quite enjoyed saying "I told you so. I'm not paying this bill." Yeah, the next card I got from them was random as hell.

[Much Fishing to Do]

More times than I can count, always the same bank same brand of card. My other cards have never had the issue.

Latest one was a card that has never even been taken out of my locking drawer at home (since the last time they replaced it) still attached to the paper (I do not think I even activated the card) it came with yet they claim it must have been used and skimmed at a gas station.

I asked them to tell me the last charge I made on it and they agree the card has never been used other than the fraudulent charges. They basically said oh well we will just replace it... that card is getting canceled ASAP.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Searched and found this old thread because I just had the same card (our main one, we only have a couple) replaced for the third time in about 14 months which seems crazy to me.  The first two times I was finding little couple dollar charges that were sneaking thru that after searching saw they were common fraudulent charges.  But this last time I got a fraud alert for a declined charge of like $2500, and went into my online account and saw a pending charge for about $3500 that did make it thru.  I'm obviously letting them do the process of replacing the card, etc but I think its time to drop this one. It is annoying to have to reset up all the auto-pays which I do with all my bills, but guess I should just be glad no one pushed back on the charges.

[JupiterGreen]

More times than I can count, always the same bank same brand of card. My other cards have never had the issue.

Latest one was a card that has never even been taken out of my locking drawer at home (since the last time they replaced it) still attached to the paper (I do not think I even activated the card) it came with yet they claim it must have been used and skimmed at a gas station.

I asked them to tell me the last charge I made on it and they agree the card has never been used other than the fraudulent charges. They basically said oh well we will just replace it... that card is getting canceled ASAP.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Searched and found this old thread because I just had the same card (our main one, we only have a couple) replaced for the third time in about 14 months which seems crazy to me.  The first two times I was finding little couple dollar charges that were sneaking thru that after searching saw they were common fraudulent charges.  But this last time I got a fraud alert for a declined charge of like $2500, and went into my online account and saw a pending charge for about $3500 that did make it thru.  I'm obviously letting them do the process of replacing the card, etc but I think its time to drop this one. It is annoying to have to reset up all the auto-pays which I do with all my bills, but guess I should just be glad no one pushed back on the charges.

That is odd. The times it has happened to me I was traveling and I think it was from a gas station skimmer twice. The last time it was stolen. I'm not sure how fraudsters get your CC # but I would go through and change all your passwords (don't forget sites like Amazon where you CC is saved). It's a pain but also a good idea to do this every once in a while anyway. Get rid of any unused accounts/delete payment information. Be sure your computer software is up to date and if you have a PC make sure you have up to date antivirus. While you're at it, make sure your credit reports at all 3 bureaus are all frozen. Check with any other people who are approved users on the CC account and have them do all that password change and delete saved payments too. Good luck. It stinks when this happens.

[Tick-Tock]

Numerous times.  A couple of memorable ones:

I used a new card to check in at a hotel in Las Vegas.  Someone then quickly tried to use that number to charge something at a jewelry store in the hotel. 

I used a little-used card to charge a cab ride in Miami.  A couple days later, the credit card company contacted me to ask about a $2,000 tire-store purchase in Texas.

I also had to change a card number once because of unauthorized recurring parking-lot charges.

[GilesMM]

Probably 3 or 4 times.


Hope this helps...

[Kapyarn]

I still have an old card number out there that keeps getting used to attempt fraudulent charges even though I have had the new card for a couple of years.  I will get an email from Capital One saying "A charge attempt on card ending in 1234 was used at XYZ shoes, please start using your new card."  I reported it a few times and now just ignore it since CapOne doesn't seem to care.

[Rob_bob]

The one time I had to replace my card it was for some type of annual subscription, which can be automatically switched to a new card I learned.  After one year the new bill hit my new card and I had to dispute it again but didn't get a new card and the recuring bill was finally cancelled.

So just because you get a new card doesn't mean you won't get billed again.

[Zamboni]

Probably every couple of years for me, too.

My business card gets skimmed pretty much every time I go to Europe. This last time I tried to be really careful, stuck to cash, barely used the card, and believe it or not it got skimmed by the lady in the booth selling public transportation tickets (the only possible explanation since I barely use that card and it was used for several fraudulent purchases in that location right after I bought my ticket . . . in retrospect she was acting fishy.)

The biggest fraudulent charge over the years was over $2000 at "Floor and Decor."
The funniest was $150 at Waffle House (entirely different incident.)

[rocketpj]

Only once, but at a very inconvenient time as we were on a short holiday in Mexico.  Visa was very good about it, but just cancelled the card and mailed us a new one to our home in Canada, which didn't at all help us where we were.  I hadn't brought much cash, and our interac card didn't work either, so the trip became significantly more frugal than originally planned.