It was brought to my attention yesterday that I am possibly an imposter. Ruby? Can you tell if it’s me or not?
There’s another Laura Hartwick that has the same credit card number as me. Sets up accounts online and uses an email address almost just like mine to buy stuff. Like weird software that spammers might use. Not that the companies that make this stuff will actually say that. Except for Ephraim. He’s a supervisor, and he said, yeah, spammers use this stuff. Made by his company. That sells stuff to the other me with the same credit card as me. That’s not really his company, he just works in the call center in another state. He sounded sort of sad and gave me a bunch of other numbers to call to try to get Laura Hartwick, the genuine real not imposter one, out of this mess.
I think the dogs can tell which one I am. Except Gustavo. He thinks I’m a stump. It’s the real Laura, Gustavo! For real! This is way too confusing for him. Because there used to be one of me and now there’s another one of me, and Holy Double Stick Tape, Batman. This is one stinky old bucket of clams you got us into this time. TWO stinky old buckets of clams. Imposter Laura. Real Laura. Imposter Laura. Crap. Now I’m confused. I’m drawing a little X on my hand in sharpie right now. REAL Laura has a sharpie X. Don’t tell Imposter Laura.
Otterpop knows. And she will totally kick the Imposter Laura’s ass when we use our notoriously shrewd and stealthy detective skilz to find her. What if she’s a zombie? Or in the Russian Mafia? Or a circus clown with tumbling skilz? The credit card company said they are on it. My friend Bev said to lock my credit report. One of my riding students said get a police report. She should know. She got so identity thefted that her imposter even bought land in Texas for her with all her invisible future money that will never come back in the future. It’s confusing. And so potentially SCREWING.
About 16 years ago, I was sitting at home minding my own beeswax when the doorbell rings (this is of course before the internet was such a wealth of info).
UPS delivers me a bright and shiny new microwave. Huh, I say to myself, I didn't order a microwave.
I call my husband, he didn't order a microwave.
I call sears. Yep they say, I ordered it. Not only that, I ordered a bunch of stuff and it seems they made a small mistake and sent the microwave to the incorrect address.
I say, "oh really…." could you give me that address? He didn't want to, but since it was "my" order he couldn't think of a reason not to.
I wrote down the address of my other identity, canceled ALL commerce with Sears, and called the police.
My police said, well lady, not much we can do since the person is in North Carolina. I called the police in North Carolina. They said, "Ahhh lady, we got murderers, what do you expect us to do." I am like WHAT!!! this person stole my identity! THey are like ruining my LIFE! For goodness sake would you PLEASE go arrest them!" Now of course they think I'm crazy.
No mam, we won't do that. You can file a report, but you know your credit card company will take care of this.
Crap. Ended up handing it through each of my credit cards. Canceled EVERYTHING. Eventually paid off all my credit cards. Now I only have one. AND I check my credit report regularly.
Such a pain. I am so sorry. I sure hope you get to the botton fast and that it isn't too bad.
I am interested in what your other identity is buying. My other identity furnished her entire house including major appliances.
V
It would seem, at this point, they have only a credit card and were buying things like software that could be downloaded. It's the credit card I always use when I buy something online. Apparently those are common to steal, now I learn. Super.
But once I started tracking them down, some of these softwares and subscriptions they bought are things spammers use, and have opt in's for other softwares that are on a 14 day trial. Or 30 day trial. After that being billed $69.99/month. From other companies. So I tracked down everything I could find. Hopefully there aren't more that are going to hit my card in 14 days or 30 days, which is now cancelled, and become delinquent accounts.
Potential surprises of the future!
They use an "alias" of my email which is impossible to find out their real email, and all the accounts used my address, since nothing like appliances was being bought, just things to download. So hopefully that's all there is.
God, that sucks. I hope you find Imposter Laura and kick her ass. Sic Team Small Dog on her! And tell Gustavo she is a stump.
Oh, that sucks Laura. Someone tried to use my identity to buy a Ford Mustang, a large load of sod and fertilizer, and signed me up for all kinds of "work from home" scams. Luckily they didn't seem to get to far in their attempts, but I still check my credit report on pretty regular basis. The police were not interested in pursuing it, of course.
Laura,I think that just happened. I was looking at my account and I said, huh, I didn't order any down-loadable software, anti virus something. It was for 69.90 or something, is that what happened to you? I called my bank and cancelled that card and contested the amount, and I also got credited from that software place. Not sure if the bank had something to do with that or not. very strange…
Tammy
Hi Tammy-
Make sure you call the company too, if the phone # is on the credit card bill. One of the things they set up had all these associated softwares that went along with it that I had to also get the phone #'s for and cancel. They also had set up a netflix account, something to search databases, an online project management suite, a bunch of stuff like that. It took talking to a supervisor to find out the associated things instead of just the first call center person on one of the charges.
So even though your bank has cancelled the card, and the companies will all reverse the charges, there may be other things that are now in your name that will show up w future charges-some of the things this person set up were 14 day free trials so the charge wouldn't have hit til the next credit card statement.
Which they still might. And then the card is shut. And then all of a sudden, you are a deadbeat, non payer. Nice, huh?
I also put a fraud alert thing on my credit report on equifax, it was free and lasts for 3 months and you can renew it for free. Means any new account like a new credit card or something someone wants to set up they have to alert you first.
The guy at one of the companies said he had gotten a lot of calls about this on Mon and Tues this week. So I wonder if someone bought a bunch of cc#'s from somewhere and is up to something w all this?