Checked Your Credit Cards Lately?

Checked Your Credit Cards Lately?

One of the more unusual scams for stealing credit cards has come to light.

Seems if you go to dinner in a nice, candle lit restaurant, and pay for dinner with your credit card, it's possible for your credit card to disappear right before your very eyes!

The way it works is this. The waiter or waitress takes your credit card off the table, and may or may not use it on the slip that is brought back to you. To be sure, SOMEONE'S credit card was used-but chances are you neither look at the imprint, nor do you look at the credit card that is returned to you to be sure that it is your own.

There is a possibility that once your credit card reached the kitchen, it was swapped for a "hot card" (a card that has already been reported as stolen.) This "hot card" is brought to you along with your charge slip, and may find its way into your wallet. Your card is then available to run!

If you notice the wrong card is given to you, it is easy enough to explain a mix-up of cards, and yours is quickly located and returned to you.

But if the "swap" works, the credit card thief has a fresh new card to use.

Checked your credit cards lately?

Copyright © 1990 Bankers' Hotline. Originally appeared in Bankers' Hotline, Vol. 1, No. 4, 4/90