There was an almost full moon last night and since the cloud had cleared, it looked spectacular reflecting off the Loch.
When we awoke the sun was shining brightly on an almost cloudless sky and Lyn announced it was time for a rest day.
The first job was to check our emails and we found an email from the ANZ bank which stated that they had investigated our claims of fraud on Mick's Travel Card and refunded most of our money. The money that they did not refund had already been re-credited by the merchants concerned. So we were all square. Or so we thought.
Mick checked that the above had indeed happened, which it had, but found yet another transaction entitled "EC Car Rental" had appeared for the sum of $A574.28. This had been debited on 21 August 2013 which was surprising as the ANZ bank had told us that the card had been cancelled on 17 August.
Mick rang the ANZ hotline to advise them of this new transaction and asked them how it was possible to debit $574.28 onto a card that had been cancelled. The guy didn't know. In fact he didn't seem up to the job to us. He told us to send a claim form in, which we did.
If you Google "EC Vehicle Rental" there are dozens of people with the same problem of attempts at fraud by car rental companies or people claiming to be car rental companies.
Some readers seem to think that we are using a Visa Credit Card. We are not as it is much too expensive to use Credit Cards due to bank charges and currency conversion costs. Our cards are Travel Cards which we loaded with the currency of the country we are visiting before we left Australia. Transactions on these cards are cost free and generally work well. On our 2010 visit we used them and they worked without a problem.
Generally accommodation booking companies, hotels and merchants only accept Visa, Mastercard and Amex and our Travel Cards use the Visa system.
The question is, since Mick's card is being charged fraudulently from all over the place, how is this being done? How did the card number get out there? Was it a crooked merchant to whom we handed our card to check the signature or is it a cyberspace fraud, maybe computer malware? Full system virus scans on our laptop show no such problems.
Anyway, apart from all of the above, we had a lovely day in the the sunshine sitting outside enjoying the fabulous scenery that Loch Carron has to offer. And today we could see the mountains.
Our hosts, Fiona and Roy at RONA B&B
Lyn relaxing on a beautiful sunny day
Views from our B&B. The background looks like a drawing.
Seals in Loch Carron
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