Well, it turns out that birthday weekend was put on hold for a few days. Obviously someone had a different plan for us. Wednesday night Ben had a ballgame at Cameron Brown fields in Germantown. While we were there someone invited themselves into his car and stole his wallet and iphone. He had put them into the middle console of the car. So, for most of the night Wednesday and Thursday we were cancelling cards and talking to the bank. Yuck! However, Ben and I were able to find the silver lining in this situation. Despite the sad change of plans here are the good things that we discovered:
1. Nothing else in the car was disturbed..CD's, headphones, baseball equipment, his Oakley's.
2. The car was not damaged or stolen.
3. When we called VISA to cancel the card they said the card was no longer active. They had supposedly sent us another card back in May and the old card was deactivated as of June 14th!! No harm done there.
4. AMEX had noticed suspicious activity after they used the card at the 3rd gas station and cancelled the card before we called. AND they already credited our account for what was spent.
5. Ben and I had withdrawn extra cash a few days ago and have been using it for everything that we have purchased for the past few days. (very random for us to do that). He had $3 left when his wallet was stolen.
6. First Tennessee had also noticed suspicious activity and placed a hold on the card.
7. All the credit cards gave us the gas stations AND times the card was used. We called the gas stations and they have security cameras. (Security!!!- Bon Qui Qui).
8. We were the only people to file a police report in Germantown on Wednesday.
9. Ben and I got to spend a lot of time together on Thursday :)
Even though this is an inconvenient situation we still feel like the Lord was watching over us. BIG TIME! The damage could have been really bad. Here are some things that we learned from this that I would recommend everyone do in case this happens to anyone else:
1. Record all your card numbers (credit and debit). Not the account number, but the actual card. The police and credit people will ask for that.
2. Record your serial number on your phone, ipod, etc. (Memphis has a security system in all the pawn shops where the person has to be fingerprinted then they run the serial number. If it is stolen...Bam they got em.)
3. Double check that you lock your car...even in Germantown, the safest town in the Midsouth.
4. Don't carry your social security card in your wallet.
5. Call the bank as soon as you notice your card is missing.
Hopefully, this will never happen to you. But, in case it does it would be best to be prepared. I hope that everyone else is having a good week. Ben and I will be glad when it is over. Oh, and I didn't even post about the storm Friday and everything that we lost in it....that is another story for another day. :)
-Sara
