Warning- Identity Theft Really Does Exist

[meisha]

We have a Royal Caribbean credit card. In February of 2005 we took a Celebrity cruise to the western caribbean. Everything was wonderful.

We used our RCI card to pay our deposit and final payment. Everything was

wonderful, again. The cruise was fantastic and I would certainly do it again

in a heartbeat. We arrived home.

 

The following day we received a call from a phone company asking if we did

in fact want this particular service. My husband told them we did not ask for

a service from them and we thought nothing of it.

 

The following day we returned home from work to find a package from "Vonage". We opened it and saw that it was nothing we had ordered.

My husband called them and made arrangements to have it returned. Two

days later another package from Vonage.

 

We called again and a person from the Fraud Department returned our call.

We also got a call from MBNA Royal Caribbean Credit Card. They informed us that there had been a few other attempts to use our card and change our

address and phone number and the request came from a party in Ft Lauderdale.

 

I told them that we had just returned from a cruise out of Ft Lauderdale. They in turn informed us that they had another fraud attempt with a cruise

passenger coming out of Ft Lauderdale. I am unsure if it was the same ship.

 

To make a long story short, or not so short, we thought everything was straigtened out. All credit card were closed. New ones issued.

 

This past Sunday we got another phone call from MBNA Royal Caribbean Credit Card asking if we had ordered a Dell computer over the internet....

needless to say we hadn't. I felt and relayed to them that I thought it had to

do with someone connected to the cruise line. They once again told me that

there were other instances of this same type of fraud happening to cruise passengers.

 

I don't know the answer to stopping this type of thing but it really is out there. Also, we did not use our credit card on shore anywhere. The only place

we used it was to pay our shipboard account and the day we came off the cruise was when the purchases were made.

 

Be mindful of who you give credit card information.

[familycruises]

It is VERY important that you contact all 3 credit agencies and make sure no other credit cards or loans have been pulled in your name. Do not wait to see if a bill shows up. Follow through immediately. They even have an online process where you can red flag your credit for any new accounts.

[kybill]

I agree with you sounds like someone from the cruise line might be in on the fruad. Try this link to get the three credit bureaus and reports free:

https://www.annualcreditreport.com/cra/index.jsp

Good Luck;

Regards:

Bill

[KINGBOBOFTHENORTH]

Yes, and put a CREDIT HOLD on your record with all 3 credit bureaus so that no new credit cards can be taken out in your name. You can remove the hold when you want credit but no one else will be able to.

 

Have you spoken to Royal Caribbean customer service. They need to know that someone on their ship in the purser's department is stealing numbers. They may be able to track the person down if this happens each sailing. I guess it could also be someone working at check-in in the terminal.

 

BobK/Orlando

[meisha]

When this first happened we began a credit monitoring service thru MBNA-Royal Carribbean. We get notice when anything changes having to do with our credit. That is how we got the call about the Dell computer. We also got credit reports.

 

No, I didn't notify Royal Caribbean about it but I probably will since it has happened again. When we had new cards issued I thought that would take care of it but I was WRONG. Since they have info on us they were able to get the new card #. I think the fraud department at MBNA is investigating because we had to sign an affidavit the first time and they indicating that we would be receiving paperwork from them again shortly.

 

I was not aware of a credit hold. How do you go about doing that? All three agencies were alerted to the situation.

 

I also thought about notifiying Celebrity but didn't because I thought Royal Caribbean would be checking it out.

[Cruising89143]

It may not be someone on a ship doing this. My aunt had a problem with a cruise line that is no longer in business back in the mid 90's. Someone took her personal information from her cruise documents including her social security number and opened accounts down in Miami for credit cards, rented an apartment, telephone, electric and so on. After a while it was tracked down to a small ring of employee's inside of the cruise lines local office in Miami.

[willing292]

I have heard that any card associated with MBNA is very easy to clone/steal/duplicate - you name it.

[LJR213]

Last November I had trouble with 2 of my credit cards one being from MBNA and the other from Chase I was very generous donating $10,000 on each of the cards to the Tsunami fund (which I'm sure was a cover). Both card companies called me immediaely and I inturn immediately called one of the credit bureaus and in doing that the other 2 were automatically notified. I have had 2 # changes since then because someone did try again but the card company called me directly....and...KNOCK ON WOOD.. I haven't had any more problems to this date. My aunt although not as generous as I she donated $9000 on one of her cards, although she recently has been buying over $3000 worth of something in California.....where she is not. She lives here in MA.

Now I'm not nieve (sp?) but it really is so sad that people in this world have to stoop to this, it's just not something I would think of or probably be smart enough to pull off. It just shows that no matter what steps we take to protect ourselves there is access to us everywhere. Hopefully this will be it for all of us. Good Luck..

 

L J

[pcur]

After having our credit card number stolen last Christmas Eve (yeah, bah-humbug!!), I am so used to Bank of America blocking my Visa that I call ahead if we are going to make an unusual purchase, just to head them off at the pass.

 

The creeps managed to get over $2,000 in jewelry off our card, but the bank took the hit for it.

 

I now check my Visa every day online, especially if I've used it out of country, or in some unusual fashion.

[sgttami]

Happened to a friend of mine when she was in St. Thomas.

 

When the charges appeared on her statement after she returned home, she realized they weren't hers and she had only used that card at one store. The billing dates coincided with her trip and the purchases were all made on the internet through stores in the US from Pottery Barn, FAO Schwartz and Williams Sonoma...about $800 total.

 

She contacted the credit card company and after investigation they tracked everything being delivered to a Chinese restaurant in Maine!!!

 

They credited her account/closed it and issued new cards and we never found out what happened but concluded that the store clerk just used her credit card# and made the internet purchases on his/her own.

 

Sadly, this goes on.

 

On my last statement all the charges were mine so I guess I'm stuck with paying the bill!!

[rubrrick]

Yes, we also had an identity theft this year while we were on the Mercury in the Mexican Riviera. I purchased a peice of jewelry for my DW in Acapulco, and by the time we returned home, over $3300. was purchased over the internet and charged to my card. The banks fraud department immediatly shut down the card, and within 48 hours we had a new card with a new number. The bank took the hit.:cool:

 

 

Rick

[Host Jacquelyn]

It's midnight, so forgive me if this is a dumb question - why would someone commit credit card fraud, and then have the package delivered to the cardholder's house? How would they retrieve it? I know the OP mentioned that they tried to change the address, but it obviously was unsuccessful. I ask because a similar thing happened to a friend of mine, and I am clueless as to what the thief was thinking

[nhoj]

You really should reconsider...both Vonage & Dell are great:)

... why would someone commit credit card fraud, and then have the package delivered to the cardholder's house?

I was wondering this too? Sounds more like vandalism than fraud.

[LogansDad]

It's midnight, so forgive me if this is a dumb question - why would someone commit credit card fraud, and then have the package delivered to the cardholder's house? How would they retrieve it? I know the OP mentioned that they tried to change the address, but it obviously was unsuccessful. I ask because a similar thing happened to a friend of mine, and I am clueless as to what the thief was thinking

 

I was at work and got a call from DW who wanted to know how I had the nerve to buy $2k worth of scuba equipment when we need a new roof. Oh, and by the way she wanted to know why I was taking up scuba. Yes you guessed it. I didn't order it.

 

Seems someone bought it on the internet "for" us. The credit card company reversed the charges and we sent back the scuba equipment postage paid. We wondered why someone would order all that... knowing that, after all, it would be shipped to my address. Seemed more like a prank than fraud. Till the credit card company told me it happens all the time. They just have someone watching the house waiting for the delivery guy to leave the goods. We just got 'lucky' and spotted the package before the stakeout guys made the grab. That made me feel even worse to think I had been watched :( :(

[tribefan]

This is one small thing that you can do to help with the theft of your account numbers. When you make a purchase and the slip they have you sign, it USUALLY has your account numbers. We were told by the bank after having our account numbers stole to scribble out all but the last 4 numbers. If the store has so type of problem, all they need are those for numbers and the transaction number. If you leave that number on the reciept, the thief has your name, account number, exp date to use again. How many times do you go somewhere to eat dinner, pay by CC, sign the reciept and leave it laying there for the waiter to pick it up after you leave? If it is a busy place, do you realize how easy it is for someone to pick that up, copy down the info and toss it back on the table?? or if the place you go do is rob, they have all the reciepts with the information. We learned our lesson the hard way after having the number stolen and a couple grand put on our debit card. Talk about a hassle with bounced checks!! Seems funny the reciept they usually give you has all the xx's with only the last 4 digits of your account number showing, you would think that is what they keep!:rolleyes:

[steve20832]

Sounds like someone got a hold of the credit card number. It doesn't sound like ID theft to me. Where else besides the ship did you use the card while you were on vacation? I usually pay cash unless it's something online (from a company I know like Amazon.com or Expedia.com) or something expensive that I don't want to carry cash. I average less than 10 transactions per month on my Mastercard. But I agree with familycruises and pull your credit reports just in case. Pay cash when you can on small dollar items. Credit cards are easy to duplicate once someone has you full card number and exp. date. Banks have little security in mind when they make the cards...

[cruisinisforme]

Sad to say identify theft does occur, I also check my two account several times a week, a few second on the web and you know whats going on. I am also in the unusual position of having access to credit so I pull my own credit twice a year. If it does happen you should definitely contact one of the bureaus (Experian, Equifax or Transunion) and put an identify theft alert on there, this way they can only do minimal damage to your credit. In all of your cases the cc took care of it for you, but when it goes further and they actually get to open an acct in your name that you dont know about, the damage really occurs and there is nothing you can do but say your were a victim of identity theft on your credit report, but that doesnt help the credit score at all,.

[cruisinisforme]

By the way a lot of these people arent getting the number from your receipt, they are usually right around you waiting for you to take your cc out and then look at the number and write it down, and I am guilty of this myself, but you should really not take your card out until you are ready to pay and make sure the numbers are covered. My aunt used her cc to make a phone call and within 3 hours she had a ton of charges on her account and the cc company called her right away and stopped anything else.

[ilivefordreams]

I just to work in a store where we wrote credit card numbers are written on the invoices. We shred them carefully but there was one time that a stack of these invoices were stolen. It turns out that the thiefs would exchange these credit card numbers for drugs. Some people, aye?

[dmerc]

I find it such a coinsidence that when I cam back from my cruise on the voyager in june on sunday the 26th that on the 27th i tried to use my credit card (discover) and was told it was declined. I called discover to find out that on the morning of the 27th i ok'd a balance transfer of almost $6000.00 and discover had put a stop on my card to investigate fraud. Now this is the card that we used to pay off our seapass account and I also used it for one private excursion in Grand Cayman.

Something seems very fishy to me......:confused:

I was not liable for the amount but it just doesn't sit right with me.

[IKE]

Thank you so much for the link. I think it is a great idea especially in this day and age to check your credit reports at least yearly. Will take advantage of it and its a "FREE" service.

[Aldeya]

Happenned to us last year. Twice in one month. We got call from an online Adidas store. The representative called to confirm our purchase of tons of sneakers for total of 5 grand and shipping address in Topeka, Kansas (never been there in my life).

 

Closed the account immediately, started using another card. In two weeks this credit card was denied in the store because the bank found it suspicious that we charged CD's and computer games for 3 thousand dollars in one purchase. Needless to say it was not us.

 

To this day I have no clue how and where our CC numbers were stolen, I assume, by some teenagers who went wild buying stuff on the net.

 

It DOES happen!

[Brooklin North]

Sounds like someone got a hold of the credit card number. It doesn't sound like ID theft to me. Where else besides the ship did you use the card while you were on vacation? I usually pay cash unless it's something online (from a company I know like Amazon.com or Expedia.com) or something expensive that I don't want to carry cash. I average less than 10 transactions per month on my Mastercard. But I agree with familycruises and pull your credit reports just in case. Pay cash when you can on small dollar items. Credit cards are easy to duplicate once someone has you full card number and exp. date. Banks have little security in mind when they make the cards...[/quote

 

I agree with Steve, it's a case of stolen credit card numbers " the victimless crime" and we wonder why interest rates are so high. It's the newest and fastest growing fraud out there. Internet use has made the unauthorized use of someone elses credit card too easy. What I can say is that banks are CONSTANTLY tweaking and upgrading fraud detection systems ( guess where i work :rolleyes: ). We really have our work cut out for us.

 

We can't stress often enough the importance of ALL cardholders watching their statements and advising the bank IF SOMETHING'S NOT RIGHT.

[kenandlaura06]

Theft of credit card numbers is very common and could have absolutely nothing to do with this being an MBNA card or being used on a cruise ship. Last summer, someone got hold of my Chase number and racked up $4000 of Internet purchases before Chase got suspicious. The suspicion on what happened? Thefts have computer software that runs number sequences and tries to use them until they get one that works. Thankfully, credit card companies take the hit and not us consumers directly (although definitely in indirect costs). Even scarier? Someone did the same thing (running number software) on my fiance's debit card, so when they made purchases, it emptied his checking account and then some.

 

This is very aggravating to deal with, but also very common. Don't blame it completely on MBNA or RCCL---it could have nothing to do with them.

[HatterasNC]

As a small business owner just thought I'd let you know it's not the credit card company/bank that takes the hit. If fraud occurs on the account the banks just charge it back to the merchants. So if the merchant takes a bad card they are the ones who eat it. Trust me the credit card companys very rarely lose money. You can see why a lot of internet companys will only send packages to address listed on credit card, cuts back on fraud and their loses. Don't feel sorry for the credit card banks, they get high interest plus around 3% from the merchants. I think the banks should do a lot more about verifying new accounts. They can stop sending all those new offers in the mail, they are annoying and to easy for them to get lost in mail and used by crooks.