Turns out, they really are serious about fraud protection. This weekend, I drove up to Troy, NY to relax and get a break from the hellhole that is Hartford. On Friday, I put gas in my tank in CT, just enough to make it back to Troy. Sunday evening, I stopped at the Hess station in Troy to make sure I’d have enough gas to get to Massachusetts, where the cost of refueling my car was least – and still on my route. Once I got to the Lee Plaza off the Mass Pike, I filled up my car the rest of the way. Read: Friday – Hartford, CT; Sunday – Troy, NY & Lee, MA.
My old camera was broken beyond RMA and repair, so today I bought a camera from newegg.com, which is based in California. For the past three months, I’ve not spent more than fifty dollars at one place, simply because I haven’t been able to afford to. This comparatively large purchase, combined with seemingly random uses in three states over three days raised some red flags at Bank of America.
I got an email about thirty seconds after I’d placed the order with newegg saying that a fraudulent charge could have possibly been made using my checking account, that my account had been frozen and I had to call Bank of America as soon as possible in order to unlock my account. After speaking to four different service reps, the hold was removed and I’m free to buy groceries tonight. I found the whole process rather interesting more than anything; each service rep asked me different questions in order to prove that I was indeed who I said I was. I’m sure when I called they tried to track where I was, in case I was the suspect trying to unfreeze a stolen card.
It was a minor inconvienience, but I’d rather that than some criminal have unlimited access to my checking account.
