Sorry to hear about this, Vulture. Very frustrating and happening too frequently these days. Sounds like it's time to start writing letters, or is the bank like our telco company here in Oz (one of Malc's "incompetent bastards", no doubt the same one as it's the main one) who don't have a physical mailing address either on their website or in the phone book? I ended up getting one off the back of a bill, because I want to have something rather complicated done, and when I tried to explain to the Indian person on the telephone, she cut me off. Email no good either - one of those form filling things, so have decided to write to them, so it's clear which line I want shut down and which I want to keep, basically. Know if I do it over the phone (once past voice recognition thingy which doesn't understand my accent) they'll cut the wrong one off and we'll be without internet access - horrors!
We've had a couple of incidences of credit card fraud, both with Amex who dealt with it and refunded pretty quickly (so they should the amount they charge). First was when other half was in Melbourne on business and took a taxi to the airport. A month or so later, a charge appeared on the amex card for a taxi in Melbourne when he hadn't been near the place. We had two or three more before they finally stopped. Don't know whether they actually caught him/her or they thought that was enough. Then had two charges for adult websites and when they traced it, it was coming out of somewhere in the US. Not sure about that one, as a while later, also discovered a charge for a subscription to an adult website charged to my Visa card (bank not so quick to refund in those days without a thorough investigations and have to pay charges if found not to be fraud, so thought I'd better investigate). Turned out to be 13 year old son - temptation too much and had "borrowed" my card details to sign up.
I hope it all gets sorted soon, Vulture. They ought to refund the money immediately - not as if they couldn't afford it. I've discovered too that loyalty to banks means very little these days. Time was you walked into your branch, saw the manager and he sorted out your loan/account, whatever. Now things have to be sent to Melbourne, Sydney, wherever, where they proceed to lose them and blame each other. Still, it was probably a bit too personal in the "old" days - like the time the bank manager stopped my father in the street (of a small country town) and said in a loud voice, "Your daughter has overdrawn her account by 9 pounds!" I was 20 at the time.
