Both the state of Florida and the federal government are getting into the business of issuing benefits loaded on a debit card, rather than by a paper check or an electronic deposit into your account. The government saves millions. Comerica Bank, which will issue Social Security debit cards, makes money. But for Social SecurityDisability benefit recipients, there are fees and difficulties. Its 90 cents if you want to make more than one withdrawal a month. Go to an ATM
that’s not part of Comerica and you may pay surcharges. And how do you use the money to
pay the electric bill? I don’t see the “win” for consumers here.

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Jo Ann O’Neill, who works at Broward Community College, has a morning routine. Get to work, sign on to the computer, go to Wachovia.com, take a sip of tea and call the fraud department.

Because almost every day lately, fraudulent charges made with her debit card are showing up.

Not her actual debit card. But with the information from her debit card that someone, somehow stole. The thief didn’t even bother to steal the actual card. She has no idea how this happened.

That got my attention because the same thing happened to me last summer.

While I was sitting home one evening, debit card in my purse, the thief was at an ATM at a 7-11 taking out my money. Conveniently, the 7-11 doesn’t have a camera on its machine that could perhaps lead the police to the thief. Conveniently, the store doesn’t own the machine, so why should it care?

Was it a card-reader inserted into the ATM that stole the info? Was it a tiny camera trained on the ATM that got her PIN number? I don’t think we’ll ever find out.

In O’Neill’s account, there were more than $1,000 in fraudulent charges in less than a week. Hundreds and hundreds of dollars spent to buy gas. And it continues. Which is why she ends up calling the bank almost daily.

“Wachovia couldn’t have been more helpful,” she said in an e-mail.

What you can take from this: Follow O’Neill’s advice and check your statements online daily. If anything looks unusual, call your bank, which will likely reimburse you for any losses.

Makes it hard to take a day off and just relax, doesn’t it?

photo: Bloomberg

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