Check Scam

For the past few weeks I’ve been coping with a scam: a check-washing scam to be precise.

The story starts on the first of the month. My wife, our two sons, one daughter-in-law and one almost-daughter-in-law went to Santa Monica.  We hiked around a park for a while, and then in the late afternoon the three men went to a Starbucks to kill time while the three women went shopping. Sam and I drank coffee, and Gardy walked around outside, talking on his cell to several people in North Carolina as he prepared to travel there to edit a new horror movie starring Russell Crowe.

The women had a more important task; they were buying a wedding dress for Georgia, Sam’s fiancée. When all the coffee, cell-talk, and wedding dress activity was done, we went to a restaurant in downtown Santa Monica for what turned out to be a long but wonderful dinner. The problem was we took too long at it, and we got a parking ticket.

Responsible citizen that I am, I wrote a check as soon as we got home and mailed the $53 fine in the provided envelope the next morning. However, when I looked at my account on line in about eight days, I was surprised to discover that check number 2079 had been posted to the tune of $333, and cashed by someone with the inappropriate name of Luis Angel. My online account allows me to view an image of the front of each cashed check. When I looked, the date and my signature were unchanged, but the payee, the amount, and the memo had been completely altered, the last to “Gardening Services.” Jane was sitting across the room and she heard me distinctly: “Holy shit!” Fine talk in front of clergy.

The check had been “washed,” and we were a victim of “check washing fraud.” I had never heard about this practice, but I’ve since Googled it. Checks snatched from the mail are “washed in chemicals to remove the ink.” Apparently the materials are as simple as bleach and nail polish remover. Then the alterations described above are effected, allowing the fraudster to cash them. I’m not going to explain exactly how to perform the wash operation, but I’m afraid it’s not as complex as rocket science. If only it were.

So I called the bank and spoke to the fraud department. “It’s not that uncommon,” said the unflapped bank official. “We can deal with the finances – your money is safe. But you probably should open a new account. Whoever did this could possibly continue to drain your account.”

Made sense to me. So for the past four days I’ve been talking to a very kind local bank official (who miraculously turns out to be a member of Jane’s parish), and have opened a new account. Subsequently I’ve been visiting/calling all the accounts that pay to or from our old account in order to move them to the new one. Yesterday I visited the Social Security Office – always a vivacious experience – and finished the process. Hooray!

Google has suggested that I write my checks in gel-based ink, which is harder for scammers to wash. So I have such a pen on my desk, and from now on, that’s what I’m using. Perhaps other folks have even better ideas. I’d love to hear any. Perhaps anyone with useful thoughts might share them in the comment section below. In the meantime, watch your check balances and stay frosty.