Does the Industry Profit From Credit Card Fraud?

Who says Credit Card Fraud doesn’t have profit potential for the industry? Trust me, it does and yesterday, as a cardholder, I got yet another verification of this.

I got my credit card statement in the mail and enclosed with it was a small flyer telling me that my card issuer will let me enroll in his latest product called “ID Theft Inspect(R) Premier.” Normally, I wouldn’t tell you the issuer, but in this case, I must tell you that “ID Theft Inspect” is a registered trademark of Washington Mutual. Let me tell you what this great product will give me:

• Reports from all three credit bureaus
• Monitor my credit information every business day
• Give me access to fraud specialists if there’s a problem
• Surveillance of Internet chat rooms
• Prompt alerts (they don’t say for what, but we can assume they’ll alert me to fraudulent use of my card)

OK – we all know the first point is something we can all do for free at annualcreditreport.com. And we should! As to the second point, in my humble opinion every card issuer should be monitoring their credit cards for fraud every day, not just every business day. Third point: I would hope that I don’t have to be enrolled in a special program to call the issuer, ask for the fraud department and be able to speak to someone.

That leaves the last two points. Surveillance of chat rooms is an interesting concept and there’s plenty of evidence that huge numbers of cards are traded and sold in chat rooms. And I can’t argue the benefit of a phone call or text message if my card is used by someone other than me. Except that…If my card is used fraudulently, on line or off, all I have to do is contest the charges, fill out a form, and that, dear reader is that. I get the charge credited back to my account and it’s business as usual.

Oh, did I tell you – this service will only cost me $17.99 a month, billed to my credit card account so they can add interest on top of it. What a bargain!