Vish list

Cons and scams are not just for those we think of as vulnerable: the elderly, the ill-educated, the inexperienced, the chronically-ill. The fact is, we're all at risk, and we ourselves are naive if we think we're immune to nefarious tactics.

Take the Resident Fan Boy and me this morning. 6 am. He's in the bathroom, preparing for work -- and let's leave at that. I'm in bed, having taken two extra-strength night-time cold remedies the night before.

So when the ringing jars me out of my sleep, I think the worst. Demeter is elderly and, although at present in good health, spent a week in hospital for a digestive malady a couple of months ago. Elder daughter is in Hades, having just returned from a trip to London where she had a close encounter with a pavement while running to catch up with a walking tour, and just had a chest X-ray yesterday.

I leap to the phone, which, for logistical reasons, is perched across the room. (We need a landline to operate the entrance door to our apartment building.)

It's an automated call with a woman's voice telling me dispassionately: "We wish to inform you of two recent purchases on your Visa account. One was a (moderate sum) -dollar iTunes purchase, and the other was a (ginormous sum)-dollar eBay purchase. As these are not usual purchases for your account, we are alerting you to a possible illegal use of your card. Press 1 to approve these purchases; press 2 to cancel these purchases; press 0 to hear this message again."

I press 0, and in a voice hoarse with a miserable cold which has kept me house-bound for four days, scream for the Resident Fan Boy, who finishes what he's doing (don't ask), and lumbers over to listen. He asks me to hand over his credit cards and in the haze of pre-dawn panic, my first penny drops. His card isn't missing.

The RFB can't make out the numbers on his card, but as I go to the light switch, I say: "Shouldn't you call Visa?"

Of course, the next thing he finds out is that it isn't easy to hang up on the message. It doesn't occur to either of us that he can simply make the call from his cell phone -- where he apparently gets notifications of every Visa purchase.

While the RFB listens to Muzak, waiting for a Visa employee, the second penny drops for me. At no point has the RFB's name been mentioned.

Eventually my husband is talking to a polite and reassuring person who tells him that Visa would never call at that hour. Visa-guy also shares that he himself once got about fifteen calls in a row from a scammer. Something to look forward to, because, in his panic, the RFB pressed 2 to cancel the purchases, which means they know someone has answered, which puts us well and truly on the vish-list.

The RFB works for the CRA, and together, we have laughed heartily at the attempts to defraud us, particularly with the famous CRA scam. So you might think we'd know better.

Apparently not at 6 am.