€1,000 Laser card fraud - who pays?

I was going over my bank statements from the past few months and I noticed some mysterious transactions all taking place over a single weekend, amounting to almost €1,000. We had a fair bit of cash in the account at the time because of some building work going on at the house and didn't notice.

Anyhow... I alerted my bank and they told me to report it to the police before they would investigate, which I did. Have not yet heard the results of the investigation, which I gather will involve digging up the offending laser receipts and checking the signatures against mine.

It looks like my card has been skimmed. Apparantly this is on the increase. Has anyone else had this experience? And in the event that the bank agrees that I didn't make these purchases, will they refund the money?

Hi Extopia,

I had internet fraud on my Visa card a few years back but noticed it immediately and cut it off at approx. £100 (pre-Euro). Cancelled the card immediately and the bank met the cost.

Found it amusing when I went into a branch because I was not 100% sure what the transactions were for and one of the assistants told me to leave it run until I got my next statement (approx. another month) and see how it looked then! The transactions started off @ less than £2.00 each the first day but jumped to £34, £36 a go and a few each day.
Someone said to me at that time that transactions for these small amounts do not require approval (?) so they can put thru as many as they like in any given day (?)

I could be totally wrong but I felt it happened in a restaurant and am far more careful now and do not allow the card out of sight.

I did not find the Fraud Dept. in my particular bank to be helpful and they refused to even speak to me about the problem. I got mad and dealt with their Customer Service Dept. who got the Manager of the Fraud Section to call me back and apologise!

Hope things work out for you as it can be a worrying time.

Thanks for those observations, sueellen.

Interesting that my bank never recommended that I change the card. Perhaps they don't believe me!

Don't let card out of your sight

I have heard the warnings before not to let the card out of your sight - e.g. in restaurant. How does this really work? When you are paying your bill the card is generally taken away and, depending on where you are seated in the restaurant, most of the time it would be out of your sight. Do you ask them to bring the Visa machine to your table?!

Re: Don't let card out of your sight

No - You take the bill & your card to the desk when you are ready to pay. The Visa machine is usually in public sight.

Re: Don't let card out of your sight

In my case, it's my laser card that's been scammed, not the Visa. You've probably heard that the practice of "skimming" card details and cloning a card is on the increase. This could only have happened at an ATM, or at one of the few places (petrol stations for example) where my wife or I use the ATM card to pay for purchases.

What these guys do is insert a device in a cash machine that can read the magnetic strip on the ATM/Laser card, then they use that info to make a fake card. You don't need a PIN for point of sale laser transactions.

Bi curamach, a chairde!

Re: Don't let card out of your sight

Well I just heard from my bank today that they will be refunding the money that was scammed.

Curiously, they didn't seem to think it was a huge problem and when I asked should I replace the laser card they said, "ah no, sure it was a few months ago, someone probably just chanced their arm and guessed the number"!!!

Guessing the number on a POS laser transaction?

I told them as long as they were prepared to take the responsibility for future fraudulent transactions I would not go to the hassle and expense of replacing the card -- but I find their casual attitude hard to take, to be honest.

Anyone had an experience like this? The police tell me there's a lot of it about..

Hi Extopia,

Glad to hear you got your money back.

For peace of mind purposes I would either write to the bank confirming your conversation with their clerk and the fact that they have accepted that it is not necessary to cancel the card and that they will accept any further iffy transactions or I would write to their Customer Service Manager explain what has happened to-date and ask for their advice. Let them take responsibility for the matter while covering yourself at the same time.

As I mentioned above I found the attitude of the Fraud Section in my bank to have a 'could not care less' attitude to my position whereas their Customer Service Dept./Fraud Manager were far more helpful.

Laser Card

A very similar thing happened to me last year. I was checking my online banking and noticed three Laser Card Transactions for €60.I phoned my branch and after two weeks of phone calls and another three transactions they finally lodged all the money back into my account. It was only after the second lot came out that the finally canceled my card. When i finally spoke to the Branch Manager about it he let slip that this was a fairly regular occurrence and that the only way to stop it was to cancel the card.