Quick, check your credit card statement. Do you see a charge for $9.84? The warning sounds like a scam itself, but check anyway. The Better Business Bureau is warning consumers about a credit and debit card scam that's been sucking $9.84 -- exactly that amount -- from thousands of accounts all over the nation. The idea is that it's such a small sum, people are less likely to notice it. But 10 bucks times thousands is adding up to quite a bundle for someone.
We don't know how big this scam is yet, and we don't even know how it happened, exactly. The scam has been traced to London, India, and Cyprus. At any rate, apparently someone got hold of credit and debit card numbers -- investigators think it was sometime during the holidays. But the accounts weren't charged until recently.
So what should you do? Check your card statements going back 90 days (three months). If you see that charge, tell your bank or credit card company right away. It's not just so you can clear the fraudulent charge from your own account. Reporting will also help the investigators trying to get to the bottom of this scam. You can also check your credit report for fraud.
But we should all be checking our statements for mysterious charges anyway. I used to be in the habit of checking back in ye olden days of paper statements. Now I get everything electronically -- which theoretically makes it easier to check at any time, not just the end of the month. But you know, that extra log-in step is so taxing. I'm kidding, but seriously, it's that little barrier that keeps me from checking like I should every month.
I checked just now, and I don't see that charge (or any other suspicious charges). Phew! But I'll be checking my statement more often from now on.
Have you checked for this charge yet? How often to you look over your statements?
Image via Robert Scoble/Flickr