...Oh, fuck

[Parrothead]

BG: I work at a self-storage place. The payment rules are you get a late fee at 5, 15, 25 and 35 days late. At 35 days we start the auction process. You can pay all late fees and rent before auction, but we need it before auction. OK?

On Thursday, I'm working, and I get a call from a customer, let's call her J. J rented a unit from us when she lost her job and was being evicted. J has almost gone to auction three times so far. J is on the auction list.

Anyway, J calls and asks if we have a credit card on file for her. I check and we do. So I run the card for what she owed, remove her from auction, and continue on my merry quest to read all the pages of TV Tropes.


I just got a call from my boss. The card on file up there? Wasn't hers. It was her grandma's.


Who is now suing the company.





Fuck.

[Mikkel]

Don't know if the boss will see it the same way, but in my opinion you didn't do anything wrong.
Whoever filed a credit card, which didn't belong to the renter, and of course J are the culprits here.
If grandma get an apology and her money back and the auction is held as planned, I don't think she has any reason to sue and the company hasn't lost much.

[Parrothead]

Boss isn't blaming me, and grandma ran her card at least once, which is how we got the number.

I'm just freaking out a bit, is all.

[Green_Fairy]

sounds to me like grams and J are the ones at fault. J is the one that told you to run the card and grams gave you her card number. the case, if it makes it to court, would probably be thrown out. we live in an overly litigious society and people rarely take ownership of their mistakes.
hopefully everything works out for ya

[Solumina]

Grams could have very well known from the start what was going on. J was using the card to buy some time and now grams is now suing you guys for more than was charged (I'm guessing as otherwise she would have just demanded a refund and threatened to sue). So not only did J get extra time but grams gets a little something for herself.

Whether she knew or not you are in the clear, though I totally understand being a bit freaked out.

[Hanzoku]

Well, the solutions is to let J know that she's basically using a stolen card, and unless she coughs up the money, her goods go to auction.

Refund the money back onto Grandma's card, and then at trial you have a very good defense of 'we returned the money on being made aware that the usage of the card was not authorized this time around, why are we here again?'

Otherwise, it does sound fairly scammish from the family, though that does depend on how crazy the Grandma is getting with the lawsuit threat / demand of payment.

[Seshat]

Refund the money and report the fraud to Visa/Mastercard/whomever.

It IS fraud. By reporting it, you have the utter moral and legal high ground. And if Gramma is part of a scam, you've seriously inconvenienced her.

[MaseMan]

Yeah, once you refund the money, "Grandma" doesn't have anything to stand on.

[BlaqueKatt]

Refund the money and report the fraud to Visa/Mastercard/whomever.

It IS fraud. By reporting it, you have the utter moral and legal high ground. And if Gramma is part of a scam, you've seriously inconvenienced her.

*disclaimer* I am not a lawyer*
actually, my understanding is that unless the grandmother has taken the proper steps through her CC company to report the fraud-the charge is valid-and in order to report the fraud-she has to file charges against her grandaughter. Otherwise I could give my CC to my husband/sister/mom/cat, let them buy stuff for me and then call all the stores-say my cat was not authorized to make this purchase, refund me or I'll sue!!!! And get tons of stuff for free.

There is a reason for the fraud process.

mastercard says If a fraudulent transaction occurs, contact the following for assistance:

* Your bank or payment processor
* Your legal counsel
* Your local police department or U.S. Secret Service office

[dbuzman]

Tell grandma the money is being refunded and J will be reported for theft. Then have J arrested.

[Parrothead]

It looks like my boss credited the money back to the card, I'll ask what's going on.

[PepperElf]

Tell grandma the money is being refunded and J will be reported for theft. Then have J arrested.

seconded. that way if the pair is trying to run a scam ... it will fail.

[trailerparkmedic]

actually, my understanding is that unless the grandmother has taken the proper steps through her CC company to report the fraud-the charge is valid-and in order to report the fraud-she has to file charges against her grandaughter.

QFT. I worked at a credit card company and if you said a family member was using the card fraudulently, the company wouldn't refund charges until you filed charges against the person. I know it gets even stickier with more things to prove when the cardholder previously gave someone permission to use the card.

[Parrothead]

Update!

The money was credited back from here, and I'm going to double check on Monday to see if the grandma got it.