[Leica] Credit Card Fraud

[john.o.newell at comcast.net (J. Newell)]

We are careful with our credit card use but seem to have a security issue 
every year or two. I have to say that CitiBank has been incredibly 
responsive on all of these. Examples: 

Two years ago my card was hijacked and duplicated physically. Before 
CitiBank identified the fraudulent use (which is a fascinating story), there 
were more than $11,000.00 of fraudulent charges on the card. We paid nothing 
and they sent replacement cards overnight. 

Last week the card information was hacked from an online vendor. Citibank 
called to verify suspicious recent use and it turned out that there sere 
several thousand dollars of fraudulent charges on the card. We will be 
paying nothing and got replacement cards quickly (but didn't need them 
overnight). 

Even when there has been no data theft, we have occasionally gotten calls to 
verify use when my wife and I were using the card in different locations at 
the same time, though I don't think this has happened recently. One example 
I remember was multiple, near-synchronous gasoline purchases in different 
locations. I think their monitoring has gotten more sophisticated now and 
identifies that for what it is. 

By the way, I understand that when I say "we paid nothing," that's not 
literally true. The cost of those fraudulent charges is spread out over 
CitiBank's cardholder base as a cost of their card programs. I assume they 
figure that if they held their accounts to the letter of the agreement, card 
use (which is probably a big profit center for most banks, even considering 
only merchant fees) would decline dramatically, either to competitors or as 
a result of cards being less attractive in general. 

FWIW ... 

John Newell