Credit card thief :-(

Stu posted about a credit card problem, which prompted me to relate what happened to me over the last couple of weeks.

I got snookered by a bogus Harbor Freight survey. Take the survey and we'll give you a free tool kit,  they said, all you have to do is pay the $8 shipping. It seemed to be too good to be true, but many of tools at Harbor Freight are unbelievably cheap, so maybe this is legit. Besides it's only $8.

A few days later I got an email from Chase telling me about a $70 charge they found suspicious. They were correct, it was bogus, so I confirmed their suspicions via their website, where upon they canceled my card and sent me a new one which showed up a week later.

When my monthly statement arrived (via snail mail), I noticed that the tag on the $8 shipping charge was the same as the one on the bogus $70 charge. I don't think I'm getting a free tool kit. I tried calling Chase but got nowhere, so I went to their website again, disputed the $8 charge and they credited my account immediately.

This is the second time I have had my card yanked out from under me because of some turd trying to steal my money, so I figured maybe I should get a second card. I had another card that I got from Citi a couple of years ago. I quit using it because they irritated me, but being irritated by a credit card company is like being irritated by the sun - neither one gives a shit about your irritation, they just shine on. Anyway, called them up to activate the card and they said sure, no problem, but when I tried to use it a couple of days later it didn't work, so I called them again. Oh, they tell me, that account was closed a long time ago, you'll need to apply for a new one.

The voice connection with Citi was horrible, it sounded like someone was strangling cats in the background. When I asked the operator about it she told me she was working in the office and that was just normal office noise. Yeah, maybe in a cat-strangling factory that might be normal but I've never heard anything like that in an office, or anywhere else really, except maybe when fax machines are trying to establish a connection.