(616) 980-2590

UPDATE FROM EARLIER POST:  I contacted my bank (credit card issuer).  The initial human “customer service rep” was, of course, utterly clueless and contributed nothing to the advancement of this issue.  I was trying to explain to her that my intent in calling was to explain what had occurred and to GIVE THEM THE DECISION as to whether or not to cancel my account and issue me a different number.  The only thing this initial CSR could do was launch into a long, high-pressure spiel about selling me a dubious credit monitoring service for $9.99/month, the benefits of which weren’t apparent, since she and I both acknowledged up front that I’m not liable for fraudulent charges against my account.  Finally I had to just cut her off and insist on speaking to someone in the fraud department.  I got transferred and of course, had to re-explain the whole thing from scratch.  The fraud person basically said that they were (generically?) aware of the Snuggie problem, but that since their computers continuously analyze all transactions throughout their system for suspicious activity and that my account showed no signs of suspicious/fraudulent activity, that it probably wasn’t worth the hassle of cancelling my card and getting a new one.  Moral of the story: if the credit card company is the party that gets stuck with 100% of the damages for fraudulent charges and they don’t care about taking steps to minimize their losses, then I don’t either.

This is yet another in a long list of calls received from area code 616 although this number is not the same as others I have received. I answered but "they" hung up. This is typical of a computer dialing system that when they connect to a "live" person the call is redirected to an "agent's" desk. If no agent is available the machine just hangs up.I have contacted local law enforcement and am told that while it is likely an attempt to steal personal data (read: Identity Theft) no actual law has been violated.It was suggested that my state legislators be contacted. I will be preparing a letter right away and will be forwarding it to Washington.I am also writing the local papers.

Caller with unfamiliar voice from unfamiliar area code had my name correct, asked for me by name.  Called me at work, where my ISDN caller-ID shows only the number but no name for all calls.  Multiple voices in the background made it obvious this was coming from a call center (boiler room?).  Female voice in decent English but probably not her first language said she “was calling in reference to my Visa card”.  I am an identity theft ultra-paranoid, very well-read on the topic and was immediately suspicious.  She said it was in reference to my Visa card that had the last four digits of (example) <1234>, which were correct.  She went on and on to say that "her records showed that I had been a valued Visa customer for a long time" and that as a show of appreciation for my years of continued business she wanted to "send me a package of information" that would "be of benefit" to me.  I broke in at one point and explicitly told her that I had no idea who she actually is and had no way to identify her authenticity with any confidence, and that I would give her no indication as to whether or not the four digits she recited to me were correct.  I think she was a little taken aback by this and probably realized she was not talking to a victim who would be easy to fleece.  I later asked her if she could tell me the name of my Visa card's issuing bank, and she sidestepped the question.  She droned on a bit more about my long-term customer status and eventually got to the hook: she wanted to "send" me (presumably by US Mail, never explicitly said) a package of information that I could examine that would be to my benefit, or some such tripe (connection wasn't that great - I was using a landline, suspect she was on a cell).  She was casually trying to explain that to receive this package of info, I would need to pay a small, one-time handling fee of (I think it was) $2.49.  I presume her next sentence would have been to ask my permission to bill my Visa for this fee.  I cut her off and said, forcefully, "I absolutely do not authorize this charge against my credit card, and make no indication of whether or not you have the correct Visa account number".  She said, "oh, okay, thank you” and hung up.  No doubt I would have gotten an envelope full of paper-based fraud attempts, if I had gotten anything at all from them.  I wonder if the ultimate goal was simply to see how many people they could fleece for the $2.50 fee, relying on the belief that few, if any, would trouble themselves to contest or dispute the charge.  Far more likely was that she was fishing for the full Visa account number.  While she was giving me her speech, I was typing the number she called from into various websites dealing with phone scams that I have bookmarked but the call ended before I could find any useful data.  Area code 616 is upper Michigan (not overseas, which I expected).  I assess the likelihood this was a scam at 95% or higher, likely fishing for the leading twelve acct number digits.  Wish I had demanded that she give me my entire account number to ascertain how much of my data she had (without confirming that the last four she had were correct).  She likely would have been unable to give me all sixteen digits, and I could have challenged her right there and confirmed her as a scam, for how was she going to be able to charge my card for shipping if she didn't have the full account number?Now that the call has ended and I’ve had time to type up the novel above (sorry for misspellings) and do some web research, I see that the common thread is that people who bought Snuggie blankets recently have been getting these calls.  I bought this product via the web in December and gave them my work number.  One entry on one of the phone-scam sites claims that Snuggie was hacked and that banks have been provided with the list of credit cards that were stolen.  Am presuming mine was among them, but what is unclear is if the thief got all sixteen digits or only the last four.  Gonna call my card issuer later today; no suspicious activity on my account (checked online right now).

Got a call from this # today. Did not answer. No message.