Games People Play
Remember the song “Games People Play?” It’s from the 1970’s and I, unfortunately, thought of it today when I opened the mail.
I got a letter from the company that insures my car and house. They explained the local home office had their computers stolen several weeks ago and were letting me know that the crooks might be able to gather all my personal information – including name, social security number, address, bank account number, routing number, driver’s license number and other pertinent facts from the files on those computers.
Not only is this alarming to me for my insurance agency personnel, but I am all of a sudden feeling very vulnerable…and right at the time when I am getting ready to retire.
The letter recommended that I call the credit bureaus and ask them to put a fraud alert on my account immediately. They said I should be very concerned since they could use my bank account and routing number that I use to draft my payments.
I felt the need to call my bank and two hours later I had closed my main bank account and opened another one.
Do you know what you have to do if you have your bills drafted each month and have your payroll check on auto deposit?
It will likely take me hours if not days to notify all of them of my new account and make sure they are able to change all this.
My, my, my…all this because someone stole a computer from an office.
I understand from talking with a number of the folks who tried to help me today that it could be a year or so before they start trying to use my information. When they get into these kinds of systems and try to break the passwords, it may take that long. Sometimes crooks know there are temporary fraud alerts on accounts so they decide to wait it out till folks pass that time and get comfortable with knowing nothing happened…and then they make their move on the accounts.
This makes me mad and I suspect it would you as well.
I get pretty aggressive when I deal with this kind of thing. I make sure I change accounts, notify those who I use for drafting and direct deposit processes, and do all I can to protect my account. While this has only happened once before and it was YEARS ago, it is annoying and very time consuming.
It’s just a shame that we are sometime forced to have to deal with these sorts of issues.
My wish for you today is that you never have to experience this. However, if you do, make darn sure you take it serious and do all you can to protect yourself. You will need to muster up all your inner strength to take care of something like this because of the games these kinds of people play.
~ Joellen