topic Re: Wallet was stolen. in Credit Cards

Wallet was stolen.

Adalen — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 19:37:02 GMT

I'm in the middle of a home purchase. Actually, toward the end since we might be able to close by the end of the week or early next week. I had to cancel all of my credit cards and debit cards, so they're all being re-issued. I'm guessing some accounts will just change account numbers (NFCU has already changed the CC number) while others will completely close out my accounts and create brand new accounts.

Has anyone had experience with reporting stolen cards and any resulting effect on credit scores? I had seven credit card accounts total, only one has a balance. No unauthorized charges were made as I'm sure the person just wanted the actual wristlet ($80 value) and probably threw all my other stuff to the wind.

Canceling the cards and pushing back all of my automatic transfers has been quite the annoyance!

Re: Wallet was stolen.

Anonymous — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 19:40:17 GMT

any new accounts will be backed dated and old accounts will stay there for close to a year but really should not affect your score at all

Re: Wallet was stolen.

Anonymous — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:11:20 GMT

At least you can freeze and unfreeze your credit report for free for the rest of your life. Kind of jealous.

Re: Wallet was stolen.

LisaJ — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:17:42 GMT

Ugh. I know that is a pain. So sorry to hear that!!!!

Re: Wallet was stolen.

webhopper — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:23:06 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
At least you can freeze and unfreeze your credit report for free for the rest of your life. Kind of jealous.

Hi there!

Your post was slightly inaccurate regarding the free reports. The loss of a wallet would allow the Original Poster to place an initial fraud alert. This alert is active for 90 days, with no further documents required. If the thief does indeed attempt to open new accounts, then the original poster will need to file an Identity Theft Report with his/her local law enforcement agency. The identity theft affidavit from the FTC is very helpful in this process. Once the identity theft report is complete, it can be forwarded to the 3 bureaus which will entitle the Original Poster to additional free copies of her credit report.

The process of ID theft is located in my ID theft guide in the General Credit Forum.

The guide can be found Here

Hopefully all works out for the original poster and he/she never has to file the report!

Re: Wallet was stolen.

Adalen — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:25:24 GMT

John, thank you for the reassurance.

W, I'm not really sure what you are talking about. I have no intention of freezing my reports. More hassle than I care to deal with.

Re: Wallet was stolen.

Adalen — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:28:06 GMT

Thanks for clearing that up, Webhopper. Makes sense! Thankfully I did not have much identifying information in my wallet. My address on my driver's license doesn't even match the address for my credit/debit cards. I'm fairly certain the person just wanted my wallet, but I will keep this in mind just in case I see some suspicious things start to pop up on my report.