Identity Thief

It happened to us this week. 

First, I freely admit I am anal, as I told my students today, some people use a blowdryer, I use Chase.  And some other accounts.

Every day I take a shower, every day, after the shower, I sit down with the accounts and check them.  Every single one — it’s not that hard with Quicken, but I check every account that we have setup on line, including my cell phone account.  Anything, anyone could tamper with.

Yesterday, a check went through for approximately $127.00  I realized pretty quickly I hadn’t written a check for that amount, but waited for a day to verify it, since the image was not available.

Someone created at least three checks, with my husband’s name, his DL (which even I don’t have at my finger tips), my name, my DL, and our address.  Of course, I don’t put the DL’s printed on the check.  I also can’t write as legible as the forger.

It’s been fun.  I had to close our checking account and I had to provide a list of known transactions (and darn, I should have pulled that before I left the house, I had to come back and get it).

I also put a fraud alert on our credit accounts.

My husband is happy.  Everyone whose heard the story realizes that they wouldn’t have caught the problem as quickly as I did, or gotten it resolved as quickly.

It pays to be anal.