<p>“Apparently the charges were there because of a password change, which I did do. They are assuring me it is ok. I hope they are right.”</p>
<p>If the charge is still pending and not posted yet, I would not worry about it. If you had a cc linked to your Amazon account, the change in the password might have triggered this inquiry to make sure the linked cc is still a valid one. I get these $1.00 pending charges from Alaska, Expedia, Amazon, Nordstrom, gas stations, etc. Someties the companies even warn me that they would do this to verify the account information. Just keep an eye on the account.</p>
<p>Both my H and I were victims. Last month, on our separate Amex accounts,we each have several charges that we didn’t authorize. The amounts range from $14 to $280. They were very clever in only charging a few items per card ( in our cases, 3 each) and the dollar amount charged were in line with all of our other charges so if we didn’t read the statements carefully, we could have missed them very easily. I suspect they would use the cards periodically in small amounts to see if they would go through again.</p>
<p>We reported the fraud immediately and were issued new cards.</p>
<p>^People are stealthy. And unfortuantely, for a lot of identity theft you don’t even need to be that stealthy.</p>
<p>Someone got my boyfriend’s information somehow last year sometime and opened a ton of credit cards with it. They actually paid them (most of the time) for several months… then stopped. We didn’t know until he got his annual free credit report and saw his score had dropped over a hundred points when they stopped paying-. It took six months but we just got the last one removed from his credit report. </p>
<p>It scares me how little stores and even sometimes banks pay attention to how our information is used-- I don’t trust anybody anymore. They were using the wrong DOB and weren’t being denied credit. They rented a car and either they weren’t asked to show ID or they got away with using a fake. Incidentally, THIS card was the hardest one to get out from under. It didn’t even have the correct DOB on it! This was a bank and we had to appeal multiple times before we could convince them to let us out of this account. I had to send them a ream of paper with lease agreements, W2s, birth certificates, copy of drivers license, copies of transaction reports from real credit cards, etc, to prove that boyfriend was residing, employed, and currently present in our home state at the same time the card was being used across the country before the bank would cave.</p>
<p>Some cards will show pending charges (discovercard does this now) but the only tome I have seen the dollar pending which went away was on a gas station purchase. The other time was when our account was compromised. The idiot company ( a cellphone co) old me they knew it was likely bogus but allowed it to go through anyway. ***?</p>
<p>A couple of weeks ago I ordered a $1,000 Mac from Amazon and the credit card company put a hold on it until they could call me and verify the purchase. They did not call immediately because it was late at night (like it is now). When Amazon got the denial they then ran a $1 charge. When I did get to talk to the credit card company and they ran through my charges to make sure everything was OK - they saw the $1 charge and said not to worry - this is typical for Amazon to verify charge card numbers and that Amazon then reverses this $1 charge.</p>
<p>Was at Target the other day, spent about $50, and used my Visa. Never even had to sign anything. Is this a new trend? Didn’t ask to see the card, nothing. I sure don’t like that “new” policy.</p>
<p>Yes, that seems to be a new trend, for “small” purchases. The definition of “small” changes from store to store, so I always stand there wondering if I’m supposed to sign something while the clerk blinks at me.</p>
<p>We had some weird fraud happen with our Amazon account last year. Someone got hold of our info and bought stuff that was delivered to our house! They were small items, such as a doll and one of the “Teach Your Baby to Read” books. Really odd. Then last month, someone charged several hundred dollars worth of stuff on WalMart’s online site. Grr. I make lots of automatic payments with the card, so it was a pain notifying everybody.</p>
<p>Reading this thread made me check my bank account, allowing me to discover that UPS randomly overcharged me $130 last week. After straightening it out on the phone, I have to thank you, SteveMA, for starting this thread!</p>
<p>The issue wasn’t the $1 it was that I hadn’t purchased anything for Amazon to put a dollar hold on my account. Had I bought something I wouldn’t have thought twice about the $1 charge, and then to see the same charge on my son’s account, made me very nervous. After the 3rd person I talked to, he started giving me specific things that can trigger that $1 hold and changing a password was one of them. They were testing to see if the cards associated with our accounts were still valid. Why they care, I don’t know?</p>
<p>Apparently Amazon changed their password security system about a year ago and is just getting around to getting people to create longer, stronger passwords which is why the site prompted me to change my password, thus prompting the $1 hold to test my CC. It would have been nice if they would just put something on their site stating this will happen.</p>
<p>"just"aMom–we have had that system for quite a while here. Some stores it is purchases under $25 other stores it is under $50 and you don’t have to sign. I “like” it because you can just swipe and go, I don’t like it because of the security, but then again, since so many places have the electronic keypads now, your signature on those things certainly doesn’t look like your real signature so I don’t know how secure they are anyway. No one around here even checks signatures anymore.</p>
<p>^^ Yeah, my friends and I were talking about it, seems stores don’t particularly worry (?) about not being paid for smaller dollars. I still prefer to sign…it make ME feel secure.</p>
<p>Twice at TJ Maxx, a cashier asked me to read my AMEX security code out loud to her. Both times I said I would not do that and made them read it themselves. (Yesterday, the cashier had to put on her glasses to read the code. How was she seeing what she was doing without them?!) In both instances, I told them it was not a good idea to state a security code out loud because that’s the whole point of having a security code. If it happens again, I’ll talk to a manager and suggest they change (or enforce) their policy.</p>
<p>Lately I’ve been getting emails, purportedly from Amazon but they look fake, telling me that my book order had been successfully cancelled. Of course I’d never ordered the book, so I don’t care if a fraudster is telling me I’ve succcessfull cancelled it. I don’t click on any of their links or call them or anything. Has anyone else had this happen?</p>
<p>I get tons of fraudulent emails about packages I never sent or received, purchases I never made or cancelled and other things. I delete them & don’t click on the links. If it is a merchant I do have something with, I go to their customer service from links I find and contact them directly to see if there is something I need to attend to. There are increasing numbers of pfishing attacks–I get many/day that I ignore & delete.</p>
<p>The one I was most concerned about was a cancellation for a hotel where we didn’t make a reservation & didn’t show or cancel. It used a credit card we hadn’t used in over a year because said account was superceded by another when Schwab CCs were taken over by BofA. The recreditted the account & put a fraud alert on it, closed it & issued me another CC.</p>
<p>sherpa-yes, we have gotten a few of those emails. Amazon has something on their website about those emails if you want to read more. I contacted Amazon when we got the first one and they just said to not open it- like I didn’t know that-but now it seems like they are taking it a bit more seriously. They are VERY real looking.</p>