<p>Hopefully whoever took the wallet just grabbed any cash and threw the rest away. Fingers crossed!
Such a pain!</p>
<p>I am so sorry that this happened to you.</p>
<p>Now H realizes his iPod is gone, too. So… wallet, watch and iPod; I don’t think it’s going to be enough to meet our insurance deductible unfortunately. Like I said, though, could have been much worse - he walked right past my wallet, H’s iPhone and a laptop computer without taking them.</p>
<p>I just found out my identity has been stolen, so I have been working on the Identity Theft affidavit to start the whole process. Annualcreditreport.com and ReportFraud.ftc.gov are helpful sites that walk you through the steps. With a police report, you might be able to put a freeze at the credit agencies for free.</p>
<p>Good luck.</p>
<p>It’s amazing what a police report number can get you - per the DMV website, H will not have to pay a fee to replace his drivers license if he has a police report number.</p>
<p>Ugh, so sorry teriwtt. How frightening to have someone actually come into your home.</p>
<p>We had our car window smashed and a bag taken just a few days ago. There was nothing of ‘value’ in the bag. It did contain a bank statement an my father’s death certificate. On a hunch we looked around the area near the vehicle. The bag had been tossed in the bushes not 10 yards away. We recovered everything. Do you know if the perpetrator was on foot? Just in case the police didn’t suggest this…try looking around, as someone else mentioned, they may have simply grabbed the cash and dumped the wallet. If on foot, they wouldn’t want to carry excess baggage.</p>
<p>So sorry this happened to you - glad everyone is (physically) ok even if psychologically on edge. Hopefully, the thief just took the cash and threw away the wallet, and your hours of phoning end up just being a good backup.</p>
<p>Yes, the police have looked around, as well as H, and our neighbor as they walked the dogs in the area yesterday.</p>
<p>I watched too much of The Wire this past spring. I’m having visions of the perpetrator throwing the wallet down a sewer drain.</p>
<p>Anyway, am starting with Equifax, which has been totally frustrating. A section of their website says if we provide a police report, because we live in Illinois (every state is different) it doesn’t cost us anything to put the freeze on. But the form then asks for a credit card number, and we don’t have one, since we canceled it! The only thing I could find said we needed to mail in the information if we have a police report - umm, by the time we mail something in and it gets there and gets processed, I’ll bet it could take over a week. So I finally found a live chat, and spoke with them. They gave me a number to speak with someone directly (could not find that on their website), so I’m on hold now. I hope the other two agencies aren’t as difficult to work with.</p>
<p>Update - the woman I spoke to gave me a fax number to send all the required information to, so at least I don’t have to snail mail it.</p>
<p>I was gonna say, I will loan you my dog, but you have dogs and they still broke in?
My dog would eat them.
I would worry that they would come back, after they got a look around.</p>
<p>Our dog is crated during the night, and in the basement nonetheless, so no help there. When the police arrived and went down in the basement to check and make sure no one was there, he didn’t even bark then.</p>
<p>As of last night, we now know how to use the ADT system (had it installed many years ago and never got into the habit of using it, so we forgot how), and are now arming it at night, so let them come back - the alarm will sound upon any door or basement window being opened. </p>
<p>Just in case this ever happens to anyone else, and they want to refer to this thread, here’s the latest update. I searched and searched and tried many telephone prompts with Experian, but was unable to speak live with anyone, and they had no instant chat service like Equifax. Experian did offer a form to print that you fill in all the necessary information, provide documentation, and snail mail it in. I will take care of this tonight and send it overnight certified mail tomorrow.</p>
<p>TransUnion, on the other hand, let me do the entire security freeze on an automated line, and never asked me for a credit card number. They did mention a packet we would be getting in the mail in a few days, and I’m guessing there will be instructions on how to complete a final authorization to resolve this via phone.</p>
<p>Had an interesting experience at the police station giving my prints… I guess I don’t watch enough crime drama shows. Each finger gets four prints… the middle of the finger, each side, and the finger tip - so 20 prints for the fingers. Then they do hand/palm prints, and three of each - the middle, and each side. Needless to say, I was full of black ink that took over five minutes to wash off. Any crime show I ever watched only showed them taking one of each finger, and never any palm/hand! While I was at the police station, I told the officer about the difficulty of trying to speak to a live person at the three agencies. He gave me a copy of the contact information they have on file from the FTC, but those numbers didn’t get me anywhere differently than the ones I found online. </p>
<p>As I started to review some of the many conversations I had with people early Sunday morning during/after the police were here, I started to doubt if I heard the directions regarding getting replacement credit cards accurately (other than the 7-10 days), so I called Visa back today just to make sure they automatically put in the system to send out new cards. I got a very helpful person who was able to tell me that our cards had already gone out in the mail today. Regardless, H did talk to a branch manager at the credit union today - the branch manager said since they’re a rather small credit union (compared to the many large commercial banks), they outsource the printing of credit cards, which is why clients are told they take 7-10 days. He also said they hope to, in the near future, invest in the equipment to print their own cards so when stuff like this happens, people can get a new card almost immediately. But for now, it is what it is. </p>
<p>Oh, one more thing I found out… when you get a security freeze and seven-year fraud alert due to theft and you are able to provide a police report, you never get charged for not only creating the freeze, but unfreezing it, and refreezing it again. So if H and want to get that Costco American Express down the road, there would be no charge to us to temporarily unfreeze, then refreeze the account again. Nice to know.</p>