Rip Off

Bose narrates his tale of woe

How does it feel when someone drains your bank account of Rs45,000 in nine minutes flat and there’s nothing you can do to stop it? This can happen to anyone. And it happened to Bose Babu yesterday.
He had just returned from work late evening when his mobile beeped. It was a text message from HSBC Bank informing him of a one-time password for a credit card purchase of 177.45 pounds. Confused, he replied that he was making no purchase and to promptly stop any such transaction.
While keying in, three more SMS alerts beeped, this time for tickets purchased from Delta Airlines – US$ 1, US$ 360.10 and US$ 360.10. Bose lost his cool. He sprung up and dialed the HSBC customer care number. It was 8:45 pm. The lines were still busy. Finally, after getting through, he was put through the rigmarole: ‘Dial 1 for English’, ‘Press the hash key’, ‘Please stay on line, your call is important’... After losing five precious minutes on this madness, a voice trilled at the other end: “How can I help you?”

Sardar Teja Singh Bhambra

“I am being raped,” Bose yelled. “Some joker is taking all the money from my account. Stop him!!!”
Silence. Heavy breathing.
The voice came back, now in Hindi. Bose identified himself by his mother’s name, date of birth and house address. Convinced that this was a human being after all, the voice informed that there were three credit card transactions appearing on his account, totaling to US$721-odd. At US $1 to Rs63 (today’s rate), this amounted to Rs45,423 down the drain.
“I want that money back,” Bose hissed.
“I can’t… But I can block your card to prevent further misuse,” the voice offered and suggested visiting to the nearest HSBC branch to file a Customer Dispute Form.
That’s exactly what Bose did today -- after being interrogated and having to submit copies his passport pages, a scanned print of the credit card, etc. The bank’s legal team has now taken over this ‘dispute’and Bose can check on August 10, not before. End of the story.
The other disappointing story of the day was that Teja Singh Bhambra is leaving for Faridabad again. This time, he says, he won’t be back before 2015. “There’s a marriage in the family,” he explained. Needless to mention, we shall all be missing him.
Jagmohan Papneja:
It is really painful to know that Bose Babu has lost so much money fraudulently. There is every possibility that his credit card has been cloned, more so when he was abroad. It is indeed a good thing on his part to report the matter to a competent authority. As I understand, he should get back his money because he was not at fault. I feel such a provision does exist.