This is your bank calling…

Hurrah! I’ve got that Friday feeling again! And, as usual I’ve got something to be thankful for apart from the impending weekend.

This week I have been especially thankful for my bank’s fraud department. You see I got a text from my Pa this week saying, ‘Call bank on this number – they say it’s urgent and about fraud.’

Now, as you know, I don’t normally make phone calls, but the volume on my Pinkberry is quite astounding and the thought that someone was plundering my account was enough to make me dial and hope for the best.

‘’allo,’ said a voice at the other end. ‘pnfa aaah ooheiii ghiaaah, please’

Ummmmmm…

While thinking, ‘Oh crap,’ I took a deep breath and quite simply said, ‘I’m hard of hearing, I have had a call about fraud on my account and I was hoping I could sort it out on the phone as I can’t get to the bank right now.’

‘OooooooooKKKKKKKKKK,’ a voice replied, loud and clear as a bell. ‘Lee-eeet meeeeeee haaaaa-aaaave yoooooo-oour acccoooouuunt nummmmmmmmber pleeee-aaaaase.’

WOW!

Seriously, this guy was good – he slowed down and shouted so loudly that every other bank customer calling that centre could probably hear him and quite a few more besides. But most importantly, I could hear him.

Anyway, it transpired that there had been some unusual activity on my card and was I by any chance in the Dominican Republic?

‘Ha! I wish,’ I replied before realising that this probably wasn’t the time for jokes and informing him that I was not, had never, and had no plans to visit the Dominican Republic – particularly as they seem to be having a few weather problems right now.

Teehee, ahem hmmm… again not the time for jokes…

It then transpired that someone was in the Dominican Republic with a clone of my bank card have a jolly good time with it! But thanks to the vigilance of the fraud peeps this was cut a lot shorter than the thieving little gits might have hoped for.

Indeed, I have spoken to lots of people since and it seems I got off lightly with the amount just within three figures… one of my friends had a four figure sum swiped from under her nose, and The Writer had quite a large amount spent on carpets in Tunisia. It seems the thieves have far more exotic ideas about what to do with our money than we do!

I cannot, as yet, say I am thankful that I got the money back, as I haven’t. Let’s hope I’ll be able to be thankful for that next Friday…