Somebody ran five $89.xx “Gas/fuel” purchases on my debit card at “Reseda Oil Corporation”. No physical address is given.
I’m researching online to see if it’s a legitimate gas station.
My assumption is that it actually is not a legitimate gas station, that it is probably a bogus company set up for the purpose of ripping people off. I assume that because every legitimate gas station I go to I need to have a physical card. I have my card.
So is there a way for somebody to rip me off this way at a legitimate business or legitimate gas station ?
Now that I think of it… Even if they don’t need a card… Yeah this whole thing is funky I did not get it… Can anyone and like me how this was done? Obviously nobody bought five tanks of gas, either…
(All the disputing and canceling and new card issuing has been done. I’m curious if I can figure out that this is not a legit company if I can at least get that merchant account closed down or busted or something…)
[ul]
[li]It could have been compromised there, or it could have been compromised somewhere else & just been used there.[/li][li]It could have been used at the pump & just filled up a couple of cars in da hood - I run a stolen card thru & then you pay me $5 or 10 to fill your tank; that way we both make out. [/li][li]It could have been the clerk inside was paid a few to ‘look the other way’ & allow multiple txns to be run, possibly for some gas & then for some gift cards that can be used elsewhere.[/li][/ul]
The first handful of hits in Google show it to be a real business, besides, it’s much harder to open an account to take cards if you’re not real.
You’re not out anything other than some aggravation. Yes, we collectively pay for fraud/theft, but it’s your credit card co or the merchant who is eating that $450 loss, not you.
The CC company has a lot more information at their disposal & would be able to put together a much better case than you can - say you went to a restaurant on Thurs night where it was compromised. When the CC company sees a pattern of 10 or 20 cards having fraudulent charges, all with a common nexus of being at the same restaurant two days earlier it’s a pretty good clue that the breach happened there & not at the gas station that your card was used at. That info is far more likely to get the PD interested than one card being compromised at one location.
I don’t know what’s legally required in the case of debit card fraud, but I can say that my bank has always returned my money when I’ve reported fradulent debit card transactions.
Luckily it hasn’t happened often but the handful of times over the years, when it’s obvious I didn’t make the purchases I received a full and hassle-free refund.
Yes. Even if the thief doesn’t have physical possession of your card, it’s not that hard to make a fake credit/debit card. All you have to get some sort of card with a magnetic stripe, like a hotel key card, grocery store loyalty card, etc. Then you reprogram it with the stolen card information. Then take it to a gas station that hasn’t yet updated the card readers on their pumps with chip readers. The reader will totally recognize it as your debit card, and the thieves get free gas. This is exactly the kind of fraud the chipped cards are meant to prevent.
Gas stations are a particularly popular place to use fake cards because there’s no one there checking them. Try to use it in a store and the cashier is more likely to notice it’s not a real credit card, and most stores have gone to chip readers now. In your case the thief obviously used your stolen info to fill up five vehicles, probably by sharing it with four friends. They wanted to get as much free gas as possible before you noticed the fraud and canceled the card.
Both Visa and Mastercard have Zero Liability policies for all transactions (including debit card) processed through their networks in the United States. This includes all “signature” transactions and some PIN transactions. You can argue about whether US law requires this, but both Visa and Mastercard provide it in the US.
You can also reprogram the magnetic stripe on a credit or debit card that has been lost or stolen. That’s what makes stolen credit cards valuable even after they have been reported and deactivated. Using what looks like a valid credit card is less suspicious than using a hotel key card. And that’s why some stores required the clerk to manually type in the last four digits printed on the face of the credit card: to make sure what was on the credit card matched what was on the stripe.
Of course, you can’t (practically speaking) reprogram the chip on a chip card, but many merchants allow you to swipe the magnetic strip after the chip fails.