Debit card fraud - what next?

pranal

hi,

my wife receive a letter on a Monday from AIB bank saying that, someone was trying to access her account, we immediately checked her internet banking and saw some unusual transactions in US dollars,we immediately cancelled her card and saw the balance,up to 4000 was withdrawn from her account.
we immediately went to garda station and lodged a complaint.
next morning when we went to the bank we figured out that upto 10000 was missing from her account, she was totally in a shock.

the bank gave a complaint form and said if the fraud is proved she would get her money back into her account, and it would take upto 60 days for the whole process.

she only used her card 4 times in last 2 years
1.pay her o2 bill 2. tescos 3. pay board gais bill
4.in a restaurant

she is surprised why the bank did not cancel her card immediately when the bank found out some unusual transactions were happening on her account rather sending a letter by post on a Thursday evening which we only received on monday. gave the person whole weekend to withdraw money.

she is completely depressed all our hard earned money, which we were saving for a purpose is gone, and don't know if its going to comeback(young family with a two year old)

please suggest if anybody has faced a similar situation and what is the best way to handle the whole thing

quarryman

hi pranal, see my post above. I found AIB very good at sorting this kind of issue. The fact that they noticed the issue plays in your favour since they will most likely acknowledge it was fraud.

Don't worry, you'll get your money back.

seamus

As quarryman says pranal, it's very unlikely that you won't get your money back, especially if the transactions took place in foreign currencies/foreign places.

My recommendation in future would be to maintain a shadow account - maybe a savings account where you store your larger sums of cash. You keep your current account at a certain level (say €2k) for day-to-day stuff and your shadow account (with no ATM or Debit Card) for holding your cash. You can use online banking to transfer funds immediately between the accounts if/when needed (both accounts obviously need to be with the same bank).

This means that the bulk of your money is not exposed/available to fraudsters, but you still have fairly instant access to your money.

BuffyBot

Seamus has given good advice - never keep that amount of money in your current account!

Also, start using Internet Banking. Never depend on your bank to do the legwork for you - monitor your own accounts on a daily basis and investigate anything suspicious asap.

It's quite likely that you'll get the money back as AIB investigate what has happened.

cormie

What card is this? Laser?

Micilin Muc

I checked my debit card account today and a €300+ transaction has been made in the United Arab Emirates from my account. I rang the bank and they immediately cancelled the card and I filled out a fraud form in my local branch. They said it'll take around 30 days to process it. I'm lucky I keep my current account balance to a minimum and check my internet banking every day or two. But who's to say they can't access other accounts that I have?

Micilin Muc

I was just talking to the card services section of my bank who told me that "a number of individuals were arrested yesterday and the Police (sic. Gardaí) contacted us here in the bank to say that your details were compromised". They reckon it was in a shop in Dublin City Centre. I'll be much more careful with shielding the keypad with my other hand in future.

tricky D

pranal wrote: »

she only used her card 4 times in last 2 years
1.pay her o2 bill 2. tescos 3. pay board gais bill
4.in a restaurant

The restaurant seems to be the most suspicious imo. I hope you did mention the restaurant name to the Gardai.

BuffyBot

Micilin Muc wrote: »

I checked my debit card account today and a €300+ transaction has been made in the United Arab Emirates from my account. I rang the bank and they immediately cancelled the card and I filled out a fraud form in my local branch. They said it'll take around 30 days to process it. I'm lucky I keep my current account balance to a minimum and check my internet banking every day or two. But who's to say they can't access other accounts that I have?

Cards are normally only linked to current/cash accounts - not savings. So unless they've got access to your internet banking details etc, they're extremely unlikely to be able to touch your card.

pranal

cormie wrote: »

What card is this? Laser?

it was a laser card

pranal

quarryman wrote: »

hi pranal, see my post above. I found AIB very good at sorting this kind of issue. The fact that they noticed the issue plays in your favour since they will most likely acknowledge it was fraud.

Don't worry, you'll get your money back.

hi quarryman, thanks for the support, how long it took for the bank to transfer the funds to your account

pranal

seamus wrote: »

As quarryman says pranal, My recommendation in future would be to maintain a shadow account - maybe a savings account where you store your larger sums of cash. You keep your current account at a certain level (say €2k) for day-to-day stuff and your shadow account (with no ATM or Debit Card) for holding your cash. You can use online banking to transfer funds immediately between the accounts if/when needed (both accounts obviously need to be with the same bank).

This means that the bulk of your money is not exposed/available to fraudsters, but you still have fairly instant access to your money.

she already had two regular savings account, but just two days before, she transferred all the savings accounts funds to current account, as the interest rate went down on regular savings account. she wanted to open an other online savings account.

this was done only after we got the advice from the AIB Savings account Advisor

pranal

tricky D wrote: »

The restaurant seems to be the most suspicious imo. I hope you did mention the restaurant name to the Gardai.

I did have the same suspicion, we immediately reported to Garda after we saw the transactions. the lady at the station took the complain and said someone would ring us about this and discuss the matter. thats a week ago.
Since then my wife rang several times to see whats happening they always took the message and the contact number but until now NO RESPONSE

kev1985

Micilin Muc wrote: »

I checked my debit card account today and a €300+ transaction has been made in the United Arab Emirates from my account.

I'm in same boat as you only for a bit more, over €2,300 gone within 4 transactions last weekend, Monday and Tuesday. Only found out when I tried to use ATM on Tuesday and was told my daily limit had been exceeded so contacted AIB who are now looking into it.
3 of the transaction descriptions now show up on the account and all in United Arab Emirates for 2800AED each + commisions. :mad:

I think I will be using my credit card anymore for all purchases and not laser, which seems to have no real advantage anyway, infact fraudsters can get direct access to your cash. At least with credit card fraud it's the bank/credit card company that's out of pocket when it's being sorted.

Something like this happened last year in Dublin with shop assistants involved in the fraud. www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/mhgbcweycwkf

pranal

pranal wrote: »

hi,

my wife receive a letter on a Monday from AIB bank saying that, someone was trying to access her account, we immediately checked her internet banking and saw some unusual transactions in US dollars,we immediately cancelled her card and saw the balance,up to 4000 was withdrawn from her account.
we immediately went to garda station and lodged a complaint.
next morning when we went to the bank we figured out that upto 10000 was missing from her account, she was totally in a shock.

the bank gave a complaint form and said if the fraud is proved she would get her money back into her account, and it would take upto 60 days for the whole process.

she only used her card 4 times in last 2 years
1.pay her o2 bill 2. tescos 3. pay board gais bill
4.in a restaurant

she is surprised why the bank did not cancel her card immediately when the bank found out some unusual transactions were happening on her account rather sending a letter by post on a Thursday evening which we only received on monday. gave the person whole weekend to withdraw money.

she is completely depressed all our hard earned money, which we were saving for a purpose is gone, and don't know if its going to comeback(young family with a two year old)

please suggest if anybody has faced a similar situation and what is the best way to handle the whole thing

Just to update

thank you every one for advice.
my wife received a call from AIB, saying that the fraud was detected and all the money is transferred back to her account

it took almost a month for the whole process,

I still wonder why the banks don't inform what exactly happened with the money and who is the culprit etc,.

something looks dodgy!

any ways, will be very careful and cancelled both the laser cards and reduced my credit limit on the CC

Its hard but as they say "precaution is better than cure"

I guess its right

homer911

For those who are ultra cautious, can I recommend NIB's current account? (I'm a customer not an employee) You can set the system up to send you an alert (by SMS or email) whenever Dr/Cr transactions exceed a value of your choice, or if the balance drops below a level of your choice. They send out alerts up to 3 times a day depending on the transaction type. You can also get a mini-statement by SMS - all for free

And now that receiving texts while roaming is free, its particulary useful while on holiday.

(Sorry if this sounds like an ad by NIB, but I find it really useful)

Toots

pranal wrote: »

I still wonder why the banks don't inform what exactly happened with the money and who is the culprit etc,.

Because they, along with the Gardai are going to be pursuing the culprits, and it wouldn't do to give all the case details away to Joe Public, and then have it find it's way through the grapevine to the ears of the criminals.