Is there a such thing as accidental fraud charges?

[Anonymous]

I have a Capital One (formerly Synchrony) Walmart Mastercard that I have not used in roughly 2 years. I mainly got it at the time for the SUB of $35 off any Walmart.com purchase.

The card after that purchase just sat locked away in my residence and was not stored in any website or password manager, nor was it used at any physical stores.

All out of the blue yesterday I got a notification on my phone from Capital One saying "Your purchase with Group Cruises Division of $600 was Approved".

Now, I have already called Capital One and they immediately disabled my old card, issued me a brand new card, gave a $600 refund, and started an investigation.

My question is, is it possible that whatever this merchant is (I can't even find them on Google), accidentally was having a legit client and they mistyped the client's account number and it charged my card or do you literally need my name to do this?

[elixerin]

Good catch esp on a SD’ed card.. as for accidental fraud or the chance that an actual customer mistyped your card is one in a billion.. they need your ZIP and name too otherwise it just wouldn’t go thru, as for how it might have been used im completely unbeknownst

[wasCB14]

Not every merchant requires the name, but generally there's some other data needed for approval:

- The 3 number code on the back (4 on the front for Amex)

- Expiration date

- Billing address ZIP code

Sounds like intentional fraud to me.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the replies, I guess it does look more like intentional then.

All I can assume is, Walmart.com, Synchrony, or Capitol One had to have some sort of breach.

I verifed that every single card ever mailed me to especially with the CO from Syn change over, was in my possession.

Not a single card is missing including the one issues back in 2017.

I wanted to rule out that anybody near my residence possibly physically stole a card or something.

[chiefone4u]

Depending on the companies credit card processor, name and address are not always needed.

As far as accidentally entering your card information, very unlikely. While the number on your card looks random, it actually has a mathematical security feature included making it nearly impossible for someone to accidentally type a 9 when its actually an 8 and having the card approve.

The card number was likely exposed during a breach in one of the Credit bureaus (Equifax for example)

[Anonymous]

Were there any other places besides Walmart, that you used this card prior to it being SD'd? If not than it was possibly a hack at SYNCH that led to you comprimised info.

Or someone you know had access to said card.

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Were there any other places besides Walmart, that you used this card prior to it being SD'd? If not than it was possibly a hack at SYNCH that led to you comprimised info.

Or someone you know had access to said card.

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Nope, it was just that one time use at Walmart.com and I noticed it wasn't even listed on Walmart.com anymore, so I must have even deleted it right after use. I like to do that, so I never accidentally charge a card that I don't want to while shopping there.

I wasn't sure if it was maybe a CO thing, as oddly the card seemed to never have a problem with SYNCH, then all the sudden 1-2 months after CO takes over, it's breached or something.

Also, nobody has access to the card, but even if I did know somebody, they'd go to local stores or something, as I don't know anybody who would be buying cruise tickets.

[Anonymous]

Sync cards seem to have way more fraud issues than most other lenders so it wouldn't surprise me if Sync has been having breaches and not reporting them. 

[Anonymous]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Sync cards seem to have way more fraud issues than most other lenders so it wouldn't surprise me if Sync has been having breaches and not reporting them. 

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You may be right! I noticed CO & Synch, not sure who's technically responsible, but my account # was not even changed at all during the transfer.

So it seems that a breach at either bank could have been it.

[longtimelurker]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Sync cards seem to have way more fraud issues than most other lenders 

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What is that based on?  If it is on reports here, I suspect that Sync cards are a large part of the population (much greater than in the wider world), but we see fraud reported on all sorts of cards.   So suspicion should only arise if fraud/#cards was particularly large for Sync, and I have no info either way.