I’m not a complainer, and any one of my friends can attest to that. So when I saw the below article, I just busted up laughing because I can totally relate to the number one consumer complaint in the country: identity theft. While most people think it’s the end of the world if their credit card number gets stolen, I’ve maintained a really positive attitude about it. Come on, when somebody steals your digits and purchases ten boxes of air fresheners at an auto-parts store two hours away, how can you do much else but laugh? So while I don’t really complain about it, I can certainly vouch to say that it’s happened to me. Lucy Lazarony of Fox Business wrote this article today:
“Have you been unhappy with your bank in the past year? Or gotten an unpleasant call from a debt collector? You’re not alone.
The Federal Trade Commission received more than 1.8 million gripes from consumers last year about identity theft, used-car sales and advance-fee loans, among others. That marked a 24% increase from 2010 and the fifth straight year that the number of complaints rose.
The big jump in complaints is largely because more sources submitted data last year than in 2010, according to David Torok, director of the division of planning and information at the FTC.
While the FTC tracks 30 complaint categories, Bankrate highlights 5 of the top 10 consumer complaints and outlines tips on how to resolve them and to avoid issues in the future.
(The five categories excluded from the top 10 in this slideshow are prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries; shop-at-home and catalog sales; Internet services; imposter scams; and telephone and mobile services.)
Consumer Complaint No. 1: Identity Theft. “
Click here to read more about when most people discover that their identity has been thieved.
I’ve had someone mysteriously jack the numbers to my credit card and make purchases with it. In one instance, the store that my identity thief visited stated that he’d swiped my credit card to make his purchases, when the whole time it was sitting in my wallet, in my pocket, about 200 miles away. How does that even work? But anyway, some people have had it way worse than me. Time to step up and protect yourselves from identity theft friends! Fool me once, shame on you… and there won’t be a “fool me twice!”
