Airline employee loses Rs 86,000 as unknown person uses his credit card to payu00a0 electricity bill

Call it sheer bad luck. Under normal circumstances, a bank won't allow a customer to exceed his credit limit while he is making purchases through cards.u00a0 But for Kingfisher airline employee Nitesh Prasand Singh, whose card details were accessed by an unknown person, this bank rule seemed to have been overlooked.

Duped: Nitesh said that transactions of Rs 86,000 was made from his card although his credit limit is only Rs 77,000. Pic/Mid Day

Nitesh was informed by his bank that he had to make a payment of Rs 86,000 due on his credit card. But Nitesh claimed he had never made such huge transactions.

"I had not receive any SMS alert or call from the bank regarding the same till then. As I was checking my payment status, I found these payments were made on a single day to clear some electricity bill," said Nitesh.
"What was more shocking was how did the bank allow the payment of Rs 86,000u00a0 to be made as my credit limit is only Rs 77,000," he added.

Nitesh is now running from pillar to post to figure out how these fraudulent transactions were made from his account but neither the bank nor the police seem to be showing any interest in his case.

"My credit card was debited six times the same day. All these fraud transaction were related to the electricity department in Mumbai.u00a0 I informed the bank by phone and mail and also sent dispute note to the bank," said Nitesh.

Bank officials say they have received the complaint and are investigating the matter. "We are in receipt of the Dispute Declaration Form with regard to the disputed transactions. We request you to bear with us till then. We acknowledge the receipt of the Dispute Declaration Form and the same has been forwarded for investigation.

We request you to revert on March 03, 2011 to enable us share the outcome of the investigation," said the bank official in reply to the complaint filed by customer. Nitesh says he had tried to contact the police too but they did not register the case.

Verify your emails

Beware of replying to any e-mail purportedly sent by your bank without proper authentication. Noida-based marketing executive, Vivek Dabral, learnt this the hard way when he replied to an innocuous looking mail. "In the month of October, I got a mail from my bank asking me to verify my account details. The mail appeared so authentic that I replied and didn't even check my account. Although it was a salary account but I was using it for my savings. On November 11 when I tried to open my account through the Internet, I couldn't do so with my existing password. I asked for a new password after and when I checked the account I found Rs 1,31,000 missing. I immediately informed my bank," said Vivek. u00a0The money was so smartly withdrawn from the account that no one could smell any foul play. "There was Rs 1,42,000 in my account and now only Rs 10,531 is left. According to the bank statement, from October 25 to November 1, the hacker made 146 transactions from my account and the maximum amount which was withdrawn from my account was Rs 2,000. u00a0Most of the transactions were of mobile payment from Mumbai and Gurgaon. Fortunately 13 transactions made returned as refund as transactions failed. I have given a written complain to the police and have asked for complete details from the bank," said Vivek. Read Next Story Say no to ragging› Trending Stories Latest Photos Latest Videos Latest Web Stories ADVERTISEMENT Mid-Day Fast ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT ADVERTISEMENT