F* You Hacker Man

Again, another update on the adventures of identity theft. (Can identity theft really be considered an adventure? Well, I guess not all adventures are good ones, so I guess it works)

I successfully have rid myself of the $600 Italian Men's Prada shoes that were fraudulently charged to my account, and then sent to my apartment. The man just came and took them away. YAY! Now the bank can get $600 back, and they're only out about $100 ($50 for one charge, and the rest for a bunch of overdraft fees and stuff).

I find this very awesome, considering that the original charges had added up to more than $800 (with all the overdraft crap).

It was one hell of a wake-up call, and I really learned a lot from this (does that sound too mature? Oops!).


(To visit the outrageous website from which the shoes were ordered, click here. I don't have anything against the website, other than I cannot afford anything on their website. Nope, not even the $97 Valentino ties that I personally, think are hideous. I bet I could find a similar tie at a local thrift-store for cheaper than what the shipping on one of those ties would be! But then again, I've be raised to be careful with my funds, so even if I had the money, I doubt I'd ever order something like that. Haha)

Italian Leather F*ING Shoes

For those that aren't totally up to date on my fight against debit card fraud, you can read about it here, and here. Today I'm running around trying to send the (as I learned today) men's Prada shoes back to Italy, signing a statement with my bank, and buying a copy of the police report ($7! bastards... They do their best to make a buck off of anything!). *Sigh*

So yeah, everything seems to be busy, but not too bad. Oh, and I have to help The Boys internet/computer challenged father* buy a plane ticket for his brother to come to a wedding in July (NOT MINE! I refuse to get married... yet). I just don't know if I will have the patience today, or try and do it later. I know the sooner I get it done, the sooner I'll be left in peace. So maybe tonite. :) And maybe I'll be rewarded with beeeer! Whee!

Oh, and I will be abandoning you guys for a couple of days this weekend, as my mom, brother and I will be driving to central Oregon to visit my favorite-est, oldest, and coolest brother**. I'm really excited to see him, his really awesome wife, and two of my cutest nieces. I'm excited to go visit them.

I'll still have access to the interswebs, but I won't be on multiple times a day, like I usually try to be. :) So, in the meantime check out some of my favorite blogs to read. (On the right hand side is a good list. The Itty Bitty Kitty Committee is my favorite, mainly because it contains massive amounts of happy kitty love pictures. Go. Now. And Enjoy)

*Helping The Boys dad buy a plane ticket will take a monster amount of patience. Last summer, when I had to help him buy one, he asked me if internet sites ever close down for the night. I looked at him *slightly* confused, and asked him what he meant. "Well, do websites ever close at the end of the business day? And weekends?" I did very well in holding in the laughter, and gently explained to him that the internet is up and running 24/7. His answer? "Well that's cool."

** Ok, this isn't fair of me, becuase all three of my brothers are awesome, older than me, and are pretty cool. It's just that Cookie, the oldest, is the original black sheep in a family of devote LDS (Mormons). He basically gave me the courage to grow up and discover beer! He even gave me my very first Corona, snowboard, and roadbike(ok, I paid him for the bike, but he put it together for me). Seriously, this guy is too cool for words. :)

Debit Card Fraud

Update on my debit card being hijacked.
(Story begins on May 20th with my post All you need is Love...)

Oh, and I got the world's best news ever (for this week at least!). After waking up last Wednesday to find that my account had been hacked, and that I could possibly be indebted ($760) to my bank over it... I physically went to my bank today to talk to them. The charges are being disputed, and I had gotten 2 of the 4 stopped by calling paypal, and c28.com and telling them my account had been compromised. They(Paypal and c28.com) were more than willing to help. Also, while at my bank I closed the hacked account, and opened a new one, and even got a credit card for my online buying. I'm all set! Oh, most important part. My bank is going to credit my account for the amount of the fake charges, and take care of my overdraft fees and everything. I about cried when the bank lady told me that. I could have kissed her, but I think that would have freaked her out, and gotten me nowhere... Hehehe. (Oh, and tip for everyone. Use your credit card, not debit card/checking account when buying online. There is more protection, since they don't have access to your actual money. Learned this one the hard way...)

Last Friday before leaving for our fabulous Second Annual Camp Buffalo Solja, I got a call from UPS double checking my address for a package to be delivered to my address. For someone that doesn't live in my apartment. I was confused by the name, then asked where the package was sent from. Italy. "Did someone really make a purchase with my card, in Italy*, and send it to me?!" Yeah, they had. I told the UPS guy on the other end of the line what had happened, and picked them up from the office. Someone had ordered Italian F***ing leather shoes, and sent them to me. I cannot tell you how mad I was over that one. More mad than the Christian apparel website that had (thankfully)declined my card.
I must admit, that I really, really, really wanted to open the box o' expensive shoes** and check them out, but decided not to. I am going to send them back, and hopefully get the bank a refund for them.

All throughout, my bank has been absolutely awesome about this. I got a shiny new debit card, a new credit card***, and a new bank account. They also are taking care of all the overdraft fees, and reimbursing me for the fraudulent charges.

I'm relieved that I got everything taken care of within a couple of weeks. My brother-in-law had his identity stolen and it took him forever to get it cleared up. His was more complicated, because it wasn't just a few hundred dollars of fake charges on a card. Someone had bought a truck, racked up a s**tload of debt, and all sorts of other fun stuff, all in his name. His SSN had been leaked by a previous employer, and mine was just my debit card number. I got lucky!



*In the previous post about this, I refer to a blank website, turns out it wasn't blank. You can order some really fancy expensive stuff off of there. (I picked the shoes up from UPS, because I was worried that someone was waiting for them to be delivered so they could steal them off my porch...)
**also to see if they were my size *cough*cough*
***for future online purchases.

All you need is Love...

Do any of you know the Beatles song? OF COURSE YOU DO! If not... go google it. Now. I demand it of you.
That said, I have a picture for you, that I totally just stole off of b-spLendid's blog. More specifically from this post Levels of Love. Go check it out. (But not if you're having a rough day, I got teary-eyed. )

Life has sneak attacked me from behind (again! Ugh) and it snuck up in the form of Identity Theft. I woke up after an awesome night's sleep to a new voicemail on my phone. I looked at the number, but didn't recognize it, so I went ahead and listened to the message. It was from my bank's headquarters and there was a problem with my account. Confused, I logged into my online banking system, and sat open-mouthed for about 3 seconds. There were 4 new charges, the smallest being $35 to the biggest being $589.41. The total charges are over $760, and I about died. All I wanted to do this morning was sleep in (which I had done) and go grocery shopping (not anymore...).
I immediately called my bank, deactivated my card, and logged a complaint. I will be getting a new card, and paperwork within a week or so. Today was spent as a full day of calling TransUnion (issued a fraud alert, and froze my credit), the local police (the detective seems really nice, but told me not to get my hopes up on getting my money back) and a good bit of time was spent freaking the f*** out. Tears, curse words, and silent screaming got me back to a level-headedness where I could start working on getting everything straightened out. (The biggest is from a blank website, and one is from a Christian t-shirt site. Yes, someone stole my account number to buy Christian t-shirts. I am absolutely livid over that one.)

Enough of that. I refuse to let being over $760 in fraudulant debt ruin the upcoming Memorial Day Weekend! This year will be the Second Annual of Camp Buffalo Solja. I am so excited. Here are mini-pics from last year.





All I need to survive this stupid identity theft, is a little love. A good weekend away from all things money, and close friends to make it better. Which is exactly what Second Annual will be. Bring on the friends, party, booze, fire, and food to make me forget life for a few days.
I hope you guys have a blast, and wish you a good, safe, healthy weekend!