More Help From The Experts Please, Important Question

[bneth360]

Everyone was so great about helping out with our Visa/immigration questions I hoped these gestures could be repeated.

A few days ago my fiancee, who is here in Phuket with me, noticed she was short a lot of money when she made an ATM withdrawal. She got home and got onto her online banking (A United States bank). There were 12 charges made in Australia totaling almost $5000 USD, all from the same mall, all in the same day. Needless to say, this is A LOT if money for two teachers in Thailand that have been out of college for less than 3 years and still owe debt.

There are a lot of details, but to make a long story short the bank said, "they had your card in 11 of the 12 transactions". In reality the card is here in our hand and has never left... scary! We assume they made a copy of it in some way. We have a few ideas as to how it may have been copied but we are obviously not experts by any means. Because they "have the card" we are fighting the bank to get the money back and its not looking good for us.

Today, the bank said to file a police report both in Australia and Thailand, and not at home in the US. We are trying to file in Australia but it is proving to be difficult as they need us there physically. We are now working with the federal Australian police.

My question is, to file here in Thailand, would we go to the "tourist police", or any police station? Is there a specific station that speaks better English than another? We are in Phuket town and we are by no means close to fluent Thai speakers. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for any help!! Everyone here is awesome!

[Sir Burr]

I've been through this scenario, but, I don't understand why you need a police report.

My card was used in various cities in Thailand, yet, I had the physical card in my possession whilst I was in Vietnam.

On my statements, I high-lighted all items that were fraudulent and sent them a photocopy of my passport proving that I was in a different country at the time of the fraudulent transactions.

The bank payed me back US10,000 that had gone missing without any quibbling.

Why does your bank need a police report when it is they that have the evidence of fraud?

[LivinginKata]

This is happening more & more these past few years. As the transaction were made in Australia I don't see how the Thia police can help. I suggest that your bank would be the appropriate authority to investigate the fraud. Sounds like the USA bank is trying to pass on the problem to you. If you can prove to your USA bank that you were never in Australia then you should not be liable for the charges. These days banks usually lookout for 'unusual' credit card transactions and quickly block an account if transactions in another country. Best of luck ... be a bit more hard nosed with your bank.

[katabeachbum]

If she was in Phuket while her (copy) card was used in Australia, no crime has taken place in Thailand and nothing is lost in Thailand. I dont see how to file a Thai police report.

If the card is still not lost, I dont see why you should have made a policereport in Australia (if you where ever there).

Provide proof of your whereabouts (passport/creditcarduse/accomodation) to your bank, and push them. The bank is to blame accepting copy cards with fake signatures

[Old Croc]

There are gangs of (mainly) Malaysians who are occassionaly stopped at Australian airports because they are found with scores of fake credit cards in their possession.

Presumably they make these cards using scanned card information probably provided by crooked traders. Scanned on to a reader when a purchase is made. Several members of a gang were recently prosecuted in Oz when caught using fraudulent cards to buy jewelery and electronics.

This link will help explain what is happening.

Credit Cards

Your bank should make full restitution when you proove the transactions were not yours.

[bneth360]

Well like all of you have mentioned, logic would dictate that no report would need to be filed here in Phuket, yet the bank is insisting on it. Why? You ask, we do not know. The bank is being HORRIBLE about this!!!! They are accusing my fiancee of giving her card to someone else who went to Australia while she stayed in Phuket. They said they are going to press criminal charges if they investigate and they determine this is what happened. My fiancee said, "good!" because we know she had nothing to do with it. The banks tone is just wrong! The problem is, we have no way to prove she physically had her card in Phuket because she did not use it during the time of the fraud, or right before or right after. Yes this looks bad! But please continue to read.

Quick history:

The fraud happened on June 4th and 5th, but my fiancee did not use her card until June 8th, and before that she had not used the card since the 27th of May. Thus the bank thinks she gave her card to someone, and they went to Australia to use it and she stayed here. FYI: yes we CAN prove we were here and have never been to Australia and that we were in Phuket.

The issue of not using the card may seem a little fishy, understandably, BUT not using the card often has been a common pattern since we arrived in Thailand. The reason it is used so little is because we use cash, and we were told by the bank to use an card as little as possible over here because fraud happens; (I am sure all of you know cash is needed for daily transactions with food and what not). Plus, she takes 10000 baht out at a time in order to avoid multiple 150 baht charges the banks impose here. Furthermore, she has only used her card 7 times since we have been in Thailand (2 months now).

To further make our point, before she asked the bank if she needed to notify them that we were leaving the US, they said, "yes", and we had them put a note on the file. My Fiancee then asked, "what if I go to Laos and Cambodia, I would like to approve those countries as well" (so the card does not get shut off while we are there). The bank said, "just call us and we will approve those countries then." HOWEVER, they did not stop the usage in Australia! A different continent!!!!

My fiancee asked, "why did you not freeze the account? There were $5000 in charges made in a 3 hour period at one mall, and 5 of the charges were made at one store!" (common sense would make anyone think something weird is going on here!) The bank response was, "oh no, its not our job to play big brother, we don't freeze peoples account like that". -what the hel_l are banks for then?

Last, her card has her picture on it. This being said, we would like the bank to look at the survaliance tapes from the stores. (two of the biggest purchases were made at jewlery stores so they must have survalliance video).

1. Mariels card has her picture on it, if the survaliance tapes shows a card without a picture on it then it is obvisually it is a fake and she whould be in the clear.

2. If there is a picture on it, then we can ask the person who sold the jewlery if the picture on the card matched the person standing in front of him/her. If they say, "yes the picture matched the person", then we know it was not Mariels card because the tape will show that it is not her!

3. Or if by some chance the picture on the card is Mariel (I am not sure if they can copy pictures) then why did the sales person sell the items to someone whose picture was not on the card?

Again, this would clear Mariel.

So needless to say were are fighting an uphill battle. The bank is being so heartless! However, we need to follow their "procedure" and file a report here in Phuket. Also we spoke to an attorney back in the US, he suggested we file ASAP also. The australian police are not helping either and are not allowing us to file a report unless we physically go to Australia.

Thanks again! Sorry this post was so long.

Edited June 12, 2009 by bneth360

[ScubaBuddha]

As the transaction were made in Australia I don't see how the Thia police can help.

Because it is very possible the card was copied here in Thailand, possibly with a duplicate card reader. Hence a crime was committed here in Thailand. Remember the British Dad and son arrested not long ago here for that?

http://www.phuket-info.com/forums/news-art...withdrawls.html

And that's just two that were caught. There were lots of stories and warnings about duplicate card readers found around that time. It's always possible the police can match your info with info found on people like Dad and son. I doubt Thai police are going to be that motivated or professional, but western police may very well do in such cases.

There is alot of reasons the credit card company is asking what they are asking. Credit card companies want every bit of evidence they can get, and to make it as difficult for you as possible. After all, you are asking them to be the ones out the money. Depending on laws of the jurisdiction where your bank or creditor it, and the small print on your agreement with the bank/creditor, you may liable for the losses, not the bank. Usually the bank will have their own insurance to cover such things, and they need to show they are doing everything they can to the insurer in their claim to them.

Remember also, from the perspective of the bank, another popular form of fraud is people will give their card to someone to do just what happened to you, then claim it wasn't them. Or variations on that theme.This is another reason why the bank is asking for police reports....a person committing this type fraud is not going to be wanting to be going into police stations making police reports left and right. It also limits the amount of fraud these people can commit by creating paper trails with the police.

I suggest you give the bank the reports they want. Also, do some Googling on this topic ans you will see that, unfortunatly, sometimes the banks won't, and sometimes legally, won't pay up. They will simply go out of businees if they do. Good luck.

Edited June 12, 2009 by Scubabuddha

[ScubaBuddha]

Well like all of you have mentioned, logic would dictate that no report would need to be filed here in Phuket, yet the bank is insisting on it. Why? You ask, we do not know. The bank is being HORRIBLE about this!!!! They are accusing my fiancee of giving her card to someone else who went to Australia while she stayed in Phuket. They said they are going to press criminal charges if they investigate and they determine this is what happened. My fiancee said, "good!" because we know she had nothing to do with it. The banks tone is just wrong! The problem is, we have no way to prove she physically had her card in Phuket because she did not use it during the time of the fraud, or right before or right after. Yes this looks bad! But please continue to read.

Quick history:

The fraud happened on June 4th and 5th, but my fiancee did not use her card until June 8th, and before that she had not used the card since the 27th of May. Thus the bank thinks she gave her card to someone, and they went to Australia to use it and she stayed here. FYI: yes we CAN prove we were here and have never been to Australia and that we were in Phuket.

The issue of not using the card may seem a little fishy, understandably, BUT not using the card often has been a common pattern since we arrived in Thailand. The reason it is used so little is because we use cash, and we were told by the bank to use an card as little as possible over here because fraud happens; (I am sure all of you know cash is needed for daily transactions with food and what not). Plus, she takes 10000 baht out at a time in order to avoid multiple 150 baht charges the banks impose here. Furthermore, she has only used her card 7 times since we have been in Thailand (2 months now).

To further make our point, before she asked the bank if she needed to notify them that we were leaving the US, they said, "yes", and we had them put a note on the file. My Fiancee then asked, "what if I go to Laos and Cambodia, I would like to approve those countries as well" (so the card does not get shut off while we are there). The bank said, "just call us and we will approve those countries then." HOWEVER, they did not stop the usage in Australia! A different continent!!!!

My fiancee asked, "why did you not freeze the account? There were $5000 in charges made in a 3 hour period at one mall, and 5 of the charges were made at one store!" (common sense would make anyone think something weird is going on here!) The bank response was, "oh no, its not our job to play big brother, we don't freeze peoples account like that". -what the hel_l are banks for then?

Last, her card has her picture on it. This being said, we would like the bank to look at the survaliance tapes from the stores. (two of the biggest purchases were made at jewlery stores so they must have survalliance video).

1. Mariels card has her picture on it, if the survaliance tapes shows a card without a picture on it then it is obvisually it is a fake and she whould be in the clear.

2. If there is a picture on it, then we can ask the person who sold the jewlery if the picture on the card matched the person standing in front of him/her. If they say, "yes the picture matched the person", then we know it was not Mariels card because the tape will show that it is not her!

3. Or if by some chance the picture on the card is Mariel (I am not sure if they can copy pictures) then why did the sales person sell the items to someone whose picture was not on the card?

Again, this would clear Mariel.

So needless to say were are fighting an uphill battle. The bank is being so heartless! However, we need to follow their "procedure" and file a report here in Phuket. Also we spoke to an attorney back in the US, he suggested we file ASAP also. The Australian police are not helping either and are not allowing us to file a report unless we physically go to Australia.

Thanks again! Sorry this post was so long.

I have a couple responses to this. I am shocked to hear the Australian police are not wanting to help you. I am certain they have task forces just like the states for just this kind of thing. I recommend starting at the local precinct having jurisdiction over the mall. If it works similar to the states, which it should, believe it or not, you should actually be able to get an investigator to visit the shops where the card was used, especially since this is so recent a case. Once you contact the police in Austrailia, find out which investigator at the bank is handling the case there and pass on the information, right down to names of people you spoke to. Also give the police the names and numbers of the investigator you speak to at the bank. Be a conduit between all parties now involved, police in Thailand, USA and Australia. Check in with them each day if you can. Expect the credit card companies to look at you a little funny because, as I said in the last post, you are a suspect too until you prove to them you aren't. Be polite but insistent. They are just doing their jobs.

USA credit card companies have been widdling away at consumer rights for a long time. Customers are not as covered as they might think. If your CC is in the USA, it's likely to be located in Wilmington, Delaware. This is because Wilmington is the only, or one of the only, places that have its own corporate civil court system. This makes litigation relatively quick and inexpensive for them.

As far as the bank shutting off your card, this is usually done automatically my computers scanning transactions outside of human intervention. For example, I told my bank I was coming to Thailand and not to shut my card off, but they did anyway. For some reason the transactions in Australia didn't tickle the right buttons for the monitoring programs to recognize the fraud. This may be a sad side-effect of telling the bank you are traveling abroad. There is no person sitting somewhere monitoring your cards activity.

Hope this helps. Good luck

Edited June 12, 2009 by Scubabuddha

[bneth360]

Thanks for all the info. All this being said, does anyone know which police department I should visit? Tourist or "local police"?

Edited June 12, 2009 by bneth360

[thaiwanderer]

Thanks for all the info. All this being said, does anyone know which police department I should visit? Tourist or "local police"?

contact the tourist police in the first instance

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/Tourist-Poli...rs-t231734.html

(as others have suggested I too am a little confused as to what purpose the bank feel a Thai police report will serve but if they ask for it so be it - all the more reason to contact tourist police first rather than trying to explain to Thai officer yourself that you want to report a crime to them (?) of someone defrauding the card in another country)

[ScubaBuddha]

(as others have suggested I too am a little confused as to what purpose the bank feel a Thai police report will serve but if they ask for it so be it - all the more reason to contact tourist police first rather than trying to explain to Thai officer yourself that you want to report a crime to them (?) of someone defrauding the card in another country)

Because if the card was here, it likely was copied here. We have seen warnings of this in Phuket in the past, and we know people have been caught doing it. Thai and farang. Maybe the police won't do a thing, but they should at least give you in incident number, if not a case number, which should appease the CC company.

Edited June 12, 2009 by Scubabuddha

[LivinLOS]

This is why using a credit card with its higher costs and fees is so much safer than using a debit card thats directly into your bank account.. I have been hit twice and both times th ebank called me, sorted it out, and refunded me before I was aware of anything.

[bellachg]

Everyone was so great about helping out with our Visa/immigration questions I hoped these gestures could be repeated.

A few days ago my fiancee, who is here in Phuket with me, noticed she was short a lot of money when she made an ATM withdrawal. She got home and got onto her online banking (A United States bank). There were 12 charges made in Australia totaling almost $5000 USD, all from the same mall, all in the same day. Needless to say, this is A LOT if money for two teachers in Thailand that have been out of college for less than 3 years and still owe debt.

There are a lot of details, but to make a long story short the bank said, "they had your card in 11 of the 12 transactions". In reality the card is here in our hand and has never left... scary! We assume they made a copy of it in some way. We have a few ideas as to how it may have been copied but we are obviously not experts by any means. Because they "have the card" we are fighting the bank to get the money back and its not looking good for us.

Today, the bank said to file a police report both in Australia and Thailand, and not at home in the US. We are trying to file in Australia but it is proving to be difficult as they need us there physically. We are now working with the federal Australian police.

My question is, to file here in Thailand, would we go to the "tourist police", or any police station? Is there a specific station that speaks better English than another? We are in Phuket town and we are by no means close to fluent Thai speakers. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for any help!! Everyone here is awesome!

This has happened to me twice, e.g. that my card was duplicated and somebody tried to use the duplicate card to make purchases, once in the UK, once somewhere in the US, while I was here in Thailand all the time. I believe in both cases the vendor refused to accept the card and reported it to the bank, and the bank froze the account. That is how I found out about it. At least I was never charged anything, but had to get a new card. I live permanently in Thailand and my VISA card is from a Canadian bank. They are very good and they just freeze the account when something out of the ordinary happens. They even froze it when I myself made an unusually large cash withdrawal at a Thai bank in Bangkok. A telephone call to them cleared it up though, and they unfroze the account. By the way what is the name of your bank, so that other people can avoid using it in the future?

I use my card regularly here in Thailand, at least once a week, doing my weekly grocery shopping at Big C, or Lotus or at Carrefour. These places are safe because they swipe your card while you watch, and they also compare my signature on the sales slip against the one on the card. I do not even have my picture on my card. I do not use the card anywhere where it leaves my sight. The 2 instances where the data were copied happened in Phuket, once the the Caltex gas service station in Thalang, now closed, and at Supercheap. At Supercheap they took the card away, because at the cash register they did not have facilities to swipe it, and it took a LONG time for it to come back. Never leave the card out of your sight ! Also when using it at an ATM try to use machines attached to a bank, and/or inspect the card slot for attached scanning devices and the general vicinity of the machine for a hidden camera to record the number you type in on the keyboard.

The people who have to come up for the damage are the people in the mall in Australia because they did not check the signature (or picture) against that of the presenter. I would just refuse to pay my bank, let them collect themselves from who is guilty and Goodbye as a customer !

Regarding a police report. The scanning of the data may have taken place in Thailand or elsewhere. The Thai police are only responsible to record a complaint for a crime committed in Thailand. You should report it at the police station in the locality where the crime was committed or likely to have been committed. I do not know about Tourist Police, normally you go to the local police station. They may not want to do it, unless you insist that the crime (of scanning the card) was committed in their district. A little under-table consideration may help in this respect (a purple bill for example, but do not make a big show of it), and may convince them to record it in their day book. It will be in Thai, and you get a signed copy. Best to have somebody with you who speaks Thai so that you can make sure everything is in the report that you need). That will have to be translated into English by one of the companies doing this type of work (Bangkok Translation Service on MaeLuang Road for example).

Wish you good luck !

[saintofsilence]

This happens to often and you very carefull , I have found the safest way to do this is dont use outside ATMs go inside shopping centres preferably next to the banks look around first before putting the card in.

I wish you luck with getting your money back