Scamming in the Springtime

There are people in this world who delight in scamming others. I don’t understand those people. Were they raised that way? Did their moral compass shatter into a million pieces along the way? How would they feel if they were on the other end of the scam?

I recently received a call from my bank telling me that it was possible that my debit card had been compromised. Now, I keep a close watch on my banking activity online, so I know when something looks peculiar. Fortunately, no one had used my card information. The bank cancelled my card as a precaution and re-issued a new one. When I went down to the branch on other bank business, I briefly mentioned that my card had to be re-issued because someone had managed to steal pin numbers from various craft stores around the Chicago area. His response was “some people are just desperate.” I disagree. I think that something this elaborate goes beyond desperation and is just plain old theft. To me, desperation is when you're standing on the freeway ramp asking for money or eating out of dumpsters because you haven't eaten in days. Stealing pin numbers from people isn't desperate, it's just plain rotten.

Somewhat related ... in the mail today I received a letter from a collection agency telling me that they were collecting on a phone account. I was completely puzzled. I pay my bills on time. Heck, I even keep an Excel spreadsheet of my bills so I can see what I’ve spent historically throughout the year. Something just didn’t seem right about the letter, so I called the phone company. Of course, they confirmed that I didn’t owe any money and they never sent anything through to a collection agency. After being put on hold for a few minutes, the rep came back and said that she had conferred with her senior supervisors and they all agreed that this sounded like a scam. She advised me to ignore the letter and said that if they (the supposed collection agency) tried to contact me by phone that I should not give them any personal information. When I Googled the name of the agency a whole lot of scam reports came up in the search. It’s just unreal. How this company got my name and address, I’ll never know. I personally think that there’s just too much information floating around out there for people to find and abuse. It’s scary.

On a happier note … it’s finally warm enough here in Chicago to plant some flowers. I went with lots of pinks and yellows this year. I can’t wait for them to all grow and spread. It took a while, but Spring is finally here.