You're right, SRS - that's the way it should happen. The person (using the term loosely) used his own (probably phony) name with my address and credit card number. I've had purchases turned down because I used my initials rather than my first name - his name is nothing like mine. And the real subscriptions that are deducted from my card monthly notified me that my card had been cancelled (as it had been) and asked me to supply a new number - wonder why his subscriptions didn't do that! The only thing I could figure is that someone at the bank was waiting for him to run up enough charges to move it from misdemeanor to felony - which would take a while as the charges were probably under $100/month.

As far as I know, all the charges were for things you sign up for by clicking a little popup box on a computer (our cats were amused at the organic dog biscuit samples, though I was less amused by the fact it was an opt-out deal and I had to call to cancel the order or I'd get a new box every month). I called the first couple of places that showed up on my statement to see what they were because I'm occasionally not sure how some things that I've bought will be billed, and they were all good about cancelling the account. Once I realized it was a problem and not an error and contacted the bank, they said to leave it up to them.

I just got a notification that they had concluded their investigation and reimbursed me what they owed me - haven't checked to see if I agree, but if it's even close I'm going to drop the matter. With a few notable exceptions, the folks I talked to (once a month, for 30-90 minutes at a time) were fairly helpful, although they occasionally gave conflicting advice, and a couple of them said they'd have my service charges refunded - which they can't do - all they can do is request to some supervisor that they be refunded, and when it was turned down, they didn't let me know - so I had more service charges the next month because I hadn't paid the charges from the last month - messy!

I just got my shiny new credit card from a totally different bank in the mail, and as soon as I know it's working, that bank is history.

JudyB