banks Archives

Once Upon a Time Well, here's another nice mess you've gotten me into

Once upon a time there was a bank. In a world besieged by hacking and bank fraud this little bank installed safety and security checks to protect it’s customers.

One day it saw a strange charge on one of it’s customers’ credit cards. The bank’s security team sprang into action!

A fraud alert was sent to the customer! The credit card in question was frozen to any more charges. The customer called the bank. Let me check this before you cancel my card, pleaded the customer. The customer then called the number for the questioned charge. It was legit. The customer called the bank back with the good news. “Unfreeze my card please, that was really my charge. The company just changed it’s name so I didn’t recognize it at first.” But the bank’s security team said “Oh so sorry, we’ve already canceled your card. A replacement one is on its way” The NOoooooo was heard for miles but the damage was done.

6 months later

It was a long and painful process. So many automatic renewals had been set up to charge to that credit card. The customer couldn’t even remember all of them. Some were found because the renewals were kicked back as declined but it looked like most had been located and accounts updated to the new card number. Then the renewal for the domain for aroundustyroads.com came due. Low and behold the company holding the domain sent a receipt showing the renewal was paid through April 2024. There were no red flags. A few notices came along in emails without identifying accounts saying the payment needed to be updated but when unidentified they were ignored as spam.

February 2022

Fast forward to February 2022. Dusty felt terrible. She was coughing and sneezing and just felt miserable. Covid had shut down travel so she missed her February Hawaii Break. This girl needed sun and warm but all that was available was snow, sleet and rain. No sun in sight. Needless to say there wasn’t much to write about and aroundustyroads was neglected.

May 2022

Dusty has been lazy too long. Time to check in with her friends, family and fellow bloggers but wait! What’s this? I can’t locate aroundustyroads.com. It’s just gone! Oh my heart and soul! 10+ years of my life wiped out- just gone!

My hosting company was so nice. They helped me trace what happened. Those unidentified emails I thought were spam? They were notices of the problem with my renewal. I’d missed this one account when I tried to update my credit card. That receipt had given me a false sense of security. My domain had expired!

The Result

A big domain company wasted no time in snapping up my little blog. They offered to sell me back my domain for a measly $2338.00. As much as aroundustyroads is a part of me, I couldn’t justify spending that much money. Maybe if my blog was a money maker but not just for an online diary of sorts. Once again my hosting company came to my rescue. They suggested Arounddustyroads.com and transferred all of my old content over.

I admit, it looks strange to me to have the “Double D” in the middle but it’s close enough so that I hope I’ll get back any followers that I may have lost. I suppose I will get used to the new name. I’m thinking that maybe I should give it a new look to go with the new name? But in any case

The bank gave me my wake-up call. It seems that someone tried to put through a charge of $85.00. It was a company that is marked on the bank’s security rolls as a fraudulent company. These people had tried to put through the charge 8 times and so far the bank had blocked it.

The security officer said that sooner or later it would slip through. Since I had never heard of the company and hadn’t ordered anything for $80 anywhere recently, they will have to cancel my card.

Why do things like this aways happen right before vacation?

Well the bank officer had a solution. She said she would Fedex my new card to my local branch and I could pick it up there. She said it should be there Wednesday.

So the bottom line is that it does not appear that I was “targeted” nor is there any relation to my blog. It’s all just a big coincidence.

I expect the bulk of my day will be taken up with more errands and housework although I have one project that I’ve been delaying that I want to to complete. The restoration of the CAT TREE.

Cat trees used to be fairly inexpensive but not anymore. A small one is easily in the $100-$200 range and can go up from there. My cats have a pretty good-sized cat tree that I got a few years ago for $45.00. The problem is that it’s been shredded to pieces. In many places it’s been scratched right down to the frame.

I have spent a couple of months looking for a replacement both in stores and online but anything in the $50.00 range is either way to fragile for my scratching fiend or very small.

My solution is that I’m going to try to restore the cat tree. In theory it shouldn’t be a big job. In actuality I’ve found excuse after excuse to avoid tackling the project but I think I have everything here just waiting so the time has come.

Well I just spent an hour trying to wrap the scratching post in sisal rope. I managed to get 1 post done..a small post. The staple gun won’t go through to the wood so I ended up strategically placing screws. I don’t want to use too many screws as that might hurt the cat. So I think I’ll wait and see if they use it and if so, will my amateur efforts hold up to kitty abuse.

I really don’t have time to spend another hour right now so that will have to do for starters. I need to run down to a local insurance agent to get an insurance stamp for the DMV so I can renew my auto registration. Of course the agency is charging a $15.00 administrative fee for the 2 minutes it will take to stamp the registration form. No such thing as Professional Courtesy anymore. It doesn’t matter that I am insured with a company they represent. I didn’t buy the policy through them so that gives them the right to charge a fee for doing nothing. Makes me think of that Southwest Airlines commercial where the SW employees are jurors and another airline is “on trial” for charging administrative fees to change a ticket. Oh well, I guess that’s the world we live in today. I’m becoming very cynical. It just seems that everything you do today has “hidden fees”. We’re being nickel and dimed to death.

It probably wouldn’t bother me except that I’m trying to hang onto my funds so I can have a little extra cash for vacation and it feels like everything is conspiring against that goal. It also bothered me because the other agency that I have used in the past wouldn’t take a fee even when I offered. I didn’t go there because this new one was much closer. Next time I may go back to driving to RI for my insurance stamp.

Well that about wraps up the day. Heading off to visit some friends for dinner. Until tomorrow, have a good day!