Posted on 05/13/2022 11:48:17 AM PDT by NohSpinZone
After a quick trip in a San Francisco taxi, the passenger handed a credit card to the driver to swipe, then hopped out of the cab.
Soon, a gargantuan charge — thousands of dollars — appeared on the passenger’s credit card bill for the ride. Despite months of pleading, the bank insisted the passenger owed the money and only relented after being contacted by a reporter.
Wait, you’ve heard this story before, right? The Chronicle’s article about Margarita Bekker’s $9,875 bill for an 11-minute Yellow Cab ride went viral earlier this year.
Three people who read that story contacted The Chronicle to say that the exact same thing happened to them. Two of them, also in September, were charged by PayPal accounts using the same or very similar names as the PayPal account in the Bekker case. One was lucky: Her Discover card flagged the $7,800 fare for a 15-minute ride as fraud and never charged her.
The exorbitant taxi trips highlight some gaping holes in consumer protection, how social engineering can circumvent credit-card protections and how consequences can be hard to come by. There’s also a clear moral for consumers: Always, always get a receipt.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfchronicle.com ...
This is why one can still drive their own vehicle or walk.
Enjoy the Freedom while it lasts.
“always get a receipt”?
How about always ask for the terms and conditions or the charges before buying.
I use few services but they always act offend or surprised when I ask for the price or the terms before the work is done. To do otherwise is just downright stupid.
This is an interesting scam... I wonder how long the scammer can make it work before Paypal and Square shut down his accounts and his SS# or EIN gets commercially blackballed by Visa/MC so that he can never again hold a merchant account of any type.
Massive chargebacks occurred to them when the banks refunded the consumer. I wonder if the scammer had already moved the funds out of their reach.
This makes me think about the title fraud thing insurance is offered for. How do banks get away with foreclosing? It seems to me they ought to be charged as an accomplice to the fraud.
The Biden economy. Everything is getting more expensive, especially cab rides!
Hey, he had to dodge all that crap.
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