On Fri, 15 Jan 2010 09:44:26 -0000, "Dan Charette"
wrote:

I'm hoping someone can tell me that I am wrong and direct me to a solution
to the problem.

I never sign direct debits or regular payments to my credit cards. For the
last two months a company called HPMP of Brussels has taken 39.99 euros from
my MBNA account. I have never made any purchases from that company or had
anything to do with them. When I googled them I cannot find any contact
details but have found others who have been scammed identically eg
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/...html?t=1980881 .

It seems reasonable to me that if I alert the credit card company to what is
a fraud that they would have a simple mechanism to check my story (they have
found the Google links and agree it appears to be fraud) refund the amounts
and stop further debits. But they tell me that this isn't possible.

They tell me that the process is that they will go back to the fraudsters
credit card company and query it. If no response or proof of purchase is
provided then they will refund the amounts. But they will do nothing to
prevent future fraudulent debits. Evidently, even if I were to cancel the
card they tell me that I will still be responsible for the fraudulent debits
for as long as the fraudsters choose to process the debits and that I will
need to call them and invoke the chargeback process for every future debit.

What concerns me - about from the barmyness of not being able to do anything
from my side to stop a transaction I have notified as not being mine - is
that the fraudsters will continue to debit accounts where the debit has NOT
been noticed and that the credit card companies are complicit with the
practice by doing nothing to prevent it. With a bank direct debit I can
cancel it online. Where is the consumer protection and fraud prevention?

Have I understood this correctly and is there anything I can do to force a
credit card to take reasonable action to prevent a fraud that they are
clearly aware of? It seems to me that failing to do so must break some
banking rule but they tell me that this is not so.

Any pointers appreciated.

The main thing I can think of is keep hassling your credit card
company. If there has been fraud on your account they should issue
you with a new card with a new account number. This should make it
more difficult for the fraud to continue.

I'd also threaten to close your credit card account - this /might/
motivate them to speed things up. However many companies do not care
about customer churn so will take no action to keep your business.

I don't know whether it is worth calling the Police. They're supposed
to be interested in stopping crime.

It might be worth posting a question on uk.legal.moderated.

You could also try contacting your MP in view to changing the law.

I had trouble stopping a CPA a few years back - it took about a year
:-(
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